Metadata: Rethinking Photography in the 21st Century

What’s behind a picture? The term “metadata” is used to describe the information that travels with a digital image file but is unseen within the image itself. In our networked digital environment, metadata is accessed by both human users and artificial intelligences. Software algorithms orchestrate what images we see and exchange while collecting the valuable data generated by our interactions. In our moment, dominated by image—based social media and surveillance, we are becoming increasing...