Is Photography Collectible Art?

I’ve been thinking about this since I visited one of my homie’s studio spaces.

Is photography collectible in the same way a painting, drawing, or sculpture is?

Not just in terms of price.
But in terms of value.
Presence.
Authorship.
Memory.

A painting carries the hand of the artist.
A drawing carries the pressure, the line, the hesitation, the decision.

But fine art photography carries something too.

A point of view.
A moment that can never be returned to.
A decision to stand in one place instead of another.
A way of seeing that belongs only to the person who made the image.

Sometimes I wonder if people collect photography differently because the process feels too familiar.

Everybody has a camera now.
Everybody can make an image.

But everybody cannot see.
Everybody cannot wait.
Everybody cannot recognize a moment before it disappears.

That’s the part I keep coming back to.

Maybe photography becomes collectible when the photograph is more than documentation.

When it carries memory.
When it carries authorship.
When it feels like evidence that somebody was really paying attention.

As I think more about art collecting, fine art photography, and the value of photographs, I keep asking myself:

Do people see photography as collectible art in the same way they see paintings, drawings, or sculpture?

Or does photography still have to fight to be seen that way?