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Photographer Thomas Struth's work examines the ways self-image intersects with collective identity, ritual, and vision itself. Some of his photographs are currently on display at NYPL's Public Eye: 175 Years of Sharing Photography exhibition. Most recently, he appeared at the annual Live at NYPL photography event, where he discussed potraits and family photo albums.

During his conversation with Paul Holdengräber, Struth challenged the cliché that photography is deceptive, preferring to focus on the interpretive work of the viewer or viewers. Likening the work of the audience to a readership, he explained:

"Photos tell something. I think one of the most boring statements that's always repeated is that photographs lie. That's so uninteresting. It's much more interesting to debate about what does this photograph tell and you, and you and you and you, and then, you know, find a kind of consensus, and try to find out how interesting that certain photographs tell a story that's readable  if you're open enough to read it and feel it, if your antenna is willing enough to receive."

Struth's antennae metaphor is emblematic of his style. The photographer described his artistic process with the voculary of a scientist and a touch of wryness:

"When I make a portrait like that I look at the situation. I make a hypothesis of what I see, a little bit like an analyst. I read the ingredients... so I'm kind of a group dynamics specialist. I know when the setup is a certain way, things happen that are true."

This truth is not necessarily simple, however. The artist recalled a photo album that once belonged to his father, a former German soldier who the photographer both credits with leading him to his medium and recalls clashing with bitterly:

"He didn't really talk about the photographs in the album. What we're talking about is a photo album that contained photographs of my father being a soldier in the fascist army and being in France and being Russia, being in the field with other soldiers having a rest with a bicycle... That was an astonishing thing to have and to look at. And in retrospect I always think that was thing that brought me to photography because I found that very disturbing. The pictures were not banal, of course, but they weren't really sensational. My father was a soldier for nine years, and he was wounded, so for him this experience was personally, in his body, very dramatic. And he spoke about that a lot, quite often. There was always a big conflict for me with him because he was not really able to say, 'I am sorry for what our country did.'"

Visit thomasstruth32.com to view the artist's photographs. You can subscribe to the New York Public Library Podcast to hear more conversations with wonderful artists, writers, and intellectuals. Join the conversation today!