“What is, strictly speaking, an aura? The strange interweaving of place and time: a unique sensation was given, no matter how close the subject in question was. To glance during a summer afternoon's rest along the line of a mountain ridge on a horizon or branch, in the shadow of which a vacationer is located, while an instant or an hour is involved in their appearance, is to inhale the aura of these mountains, this branch. The desire to “bring” things closer to oneself, or rather, to the masses, is the same passionate desire of modern people as overcoming the unique in any situation through its reproduction. From day to day, the need to own an object in the immediate vicinity in its image, rather in reproduction, is becoming increasingly irresistible.”

 

(A Brief History of Photography by Benjamin Walter)