Photography as Evidence

   

     Susan Sontag and Lewis W. Hine describe the purpose of photography as evidence. Sontag posits that "They [paintings] claim: things like this happened. In contrast, a single photograph or filmstrip claims to represent exactiy what was before the camera's lens. A photograph is supposed not to evoke but to show. That is why photographs, unlike handmade images, can count as evidence" (Sontag 47). Evidence, however is key to evoking, as presented by Hine: "Whether it be a painting or a photograph, the 

picture is a symbol that brings one immediately into close touch with reality" (Hine 111). That closeness with reality, as prescribed by Hine, brings the human condition to sympathize, and thereafter evoke change (Hine 110).

     The photograph selected, captured by Hine, shows child labor happening. Captions, rhetoric, adjectives, are unnecessary, for able beings to grasp the children's experience as it is presented in its purest form to the eye. It is unnecessary to describe the movement issued by the labor of the girl's hands, vulnerability, spirit. It is unnecessary to describe the tilt of the boy's head, not simply because he is looking at the work of his hands. This closeness to reality, as illuminated by Hine, and exactness of life captured by the lens, as developed by Sontag, is what serves to document evidence, for that which has taken place before the camera, because the photograph shows it. 

Photographic Truth

Lewis Hine is considered to be  a social photographer who not necessarily questioned the idea of what is art, but set out to document the life (working and living conditions) of the United States working class society of the early 1900’s. Hine became a teacher at the Ethical Cultural Society in New York where he encouraged his students to use photography as not only an art but as a way to educate others of what is going on socially around them. Hine was inspired by another well known photographer Jacob Riis, whose motive was in a sense to shock the audience of the crimes that were in the city of New York at the time.

This essay, describes different photography scenes and gives a scenario for each image. Hine begins to describe an image of a group of people huddled under the Brooklyn Bridge at 3 in the morning, Hine proceeds to ask where is the power in a picture, then later he says that the picture brings a sense of reality to the reader. Basically, Hine asks where does the reality lie, and how do we know that this image portrays a true reality. Since the image setting has already been altered, it adds an extra sense of reality to the image produced. Hine makes the point that  “...the average person believes implicitly that the photograph cannot falsify”, because they do not know what happens behind the scenes before the photograph is taken (Hine, 111).

I believe this image is a perfect example of photographic truth because if you were in Russia at the time, you would believe that the second image holds more truth than the one above, especially if it was circulated more than the one above, and more recent. The picture above is the original image( taken on the 2 year anniversary of the October Revolution 1919), and the image below was edited as propaganda by the Lenin administration. The image below has taken out a few important people like Trotsky after he had fell from power.

Pictorialism

   
                                                       In The Time of Trees: Poland
                                                                 Stuart Franklin

     As a noted pictorialist, Henry Peach Robinson often challenged the rules of photography as he became famous for his versatility in combination printing. Critics believed that because of the effects that pictorialist were able to obtain with combination printing, certain photographs were objective and could not be considered realism. Photography being a new form of art, different components like idealism in photographs were also in question.
     During this time, idealism was also in question when it came to pictorialism. Henry Peach Robinson believed that photographs are unique in a sense that photographers should leave their own mark in their photographs. "If we can add untruth, we can idealize" (Robinson 92).  In the reading, idealism has been defined as being in touch with the mental or intellectual. Critics believed that "foundation of all great work must be laid upon what is real and true..."
    In the picture I have included in the post, the photographer Stuart Franklin focuses on the beauty of trees and how they occupy different environments. Robinson explains to his readers the criticism early photographers experienced and based upon that, this photograph is based upon what is real and true. But the society of photography soon grew tired of this concept. Photographs of nature, portraits and landscapes had been exhausted and became less interesting because of they lacked mystery.
   Surrounding this new idea of mystery in photographs, was the new concept of impressionism. Impressionism was defined as the  the unity and order of impression gained by focusing on the subject. The subject of the photograph is to grab the viewers attention naturally. It made those observing the photographs focus and wonder what the subject of the image was. Though photography has changed over time, the concepts of realism, idealism, and impressionism hold ground in the photographic society. 

Framing

~ Perspective ~
'Magdalenas Yard', Hildesheim, Germany

www.photographyblogger.net or http://www.flickr.com/photos/littlenelly/1428439851/

According to John Szarkowski's "Introduction to a Photographer's Eye," framing is "the line that separates in from out and the act of choosing and eliminating." The borders of a frame create a relationship between all the elements within the shape of the frame by creating a focus on the image.  In a sense, a frame can intentionally or unintentionally crop the image.  However, Szarkowski reminded his readers how unattractive the edges of the images were by stating "parts of figures or buildings or features of landscape were truncated" since the plate could only capture a certain size image i.e. 8 inches by 10 inches.  Therefore, adding a frame created a more clean cut focus on the image.  During the first fifty years of photography, the edges of the images were not neat, shifting the focus of the image away from the actual image.  In essence, framing creates a central focus on the image while covering up the edges of the image.

The photograph above is from Google Images.  I selected this specific image because the circle "frame" allows viewers to centrally focus on the landscape that is in the distance. The black metal wheel-like element has a smaller ring within an outer ring, attached by spokes like a wheel you would see on a horse-driven carriage.  Through the smaller ring, off in the distance, is what looks like a mansion or a beautiful university campus that has white buildings with many windows and red-brown upside down "v" roof tops.  Also, right in the middle and behind all of the white buildings are three gray buildings.  The middle gray building has more of a rectangle/square shape and the two gray buildings, one on each side of the middle gray building, are more cylindrical in shape.  The two cylindrical shaped gray buildings have a pale pastel green colored roof top in the shape of a cone; the rectangular/square shaped gray building has a pale pastel green colored roof top in the shape of a pyramid.  Still viewing through the smaller ring, in front and below the buildings is a sizable lush green courtyard.  There are flower bushes and leafy trees lining the courtyard.  There are two cement pathways that go horizontally and vertically down the middle of the courtyard, dividing the grass in equal quadrants.  Where the two cement paths meet in the center of the courtyard is a little metal gazebo, surrounded with more flower bushes.  By looking at the entire image as a whole, the sky is blue like you would see on a perfect sunny day.  Outside the smaller ring, within the outer ring, and in between all the spokes is mainly the continuing part of the lush green courtyard in the bottom two-thirds of the image; the top one-third of the image as a whole is the sky.

This particular image I selected relates to the readings since the smaller ring acts like a frame and focuses in on the beautiful buildings along with a portion of the lush green courtyard and bright blue sky.  This particular image does not have a traditional square or rectangle frame with blunt, straight edges to essentially hide the rough edges Szarkowski stated in his chapter.  The image has a circular frame which could possibly have a deeper significance.  I do not know what kind of camera took this picture or the exact time of day this picture was taken, but you can tell the exposure did not take long at all to capture since there is an obvious shadow on the bottom one third of the image.  Again, not knowing many details of this photo prevents me from saying with confidence that this picture was altered in some way to make it look more appealing.  But the information I do have is 'Magdalenas Yard', Hildesheim, Germany.  With that information, I searched on Google to see if 'Magdalenas Yard' is the actual name of the landscape.  However, it seems as though the photographer of this image simply gave his photograph a title since Magdalenas has many definitions that do not relate to each other.  I did some more searching and found that part of the image in the picture is part of St Mary's Cathedral and St Michael's Church at Hildesheim.  Since this image is of a church, I would think this image is pure and whole, meaning it was not altered in any way.  The natural sunlight shining brightly adds to the beauty of the image by bringing out the sharp and clear details and colors.  Even the detail of the black carriage wheel is clear since  you can tell part of the smaller ring does not have the black color, but more of a silver color.  As mentioned previously, through the smaller ring the buildings are seen off in the distance behind the courtyard.  This perspective relates to vantage point because it "gives us a sense of the scene, while withholding its narrative meaning." (Szarkowski) In addition, in bottom center of the small ring, you can see a staircase hand rail which signals viewers there are stairs leading downward towards the courtyard.  This is significant because we now have a better perspective of where certain elements in the image are located.  The vantage point is looking down towards the courtyard where as the buildings seem to be at eye level but off in the distance.

Making/Taking

I took this photograph two years ago when my family and I traveled to Las Vegas during the summer.  I was fortunate enough to witness one of the many attractions Las Vegas had to offer.  This attraction in particular was The Mirage Hotel Volcano Show.  Using my cell phone, I was able to take a photograph  of the vol-cano the moment it erupted.  As you can see, as it erupted, the water and fire shot straight up, but before combusting into the air.  As John Szarkowski depicts in "Introduction to the Photographer's Eye", "All  photographs are time exposures, of shorter or longer duration, and each describes a discrete parcel of time".(Szarkowski 101)  In other words, it is because of photography that we, as a society, are able to freeze time and study what we can see as a photograph.  The concept of my reading was "Making/Taking", which ties in with my photograph well.  I was able to make or create a situation where I had enough distance, proper lighting, and a well centered location to capture the moment the volcano erupted as best as I could and interpret what had happened.  As we all know, water and fire can shoot too fast for our brains to compute. However, with  photography we are able to analyze such quick events into a still, yet comprehensible visual representation.