William Eugene Smith was an American photographer who produced photographic projects that changed how photographs were portrayed. Rather than a photo being a photo, he told stories through his photographs, through a practice called photojournalism. His photographic projects depicted people in their everyday lives, but in different situations. The photographs he took did not hide anything that he saw from the audience no matter how graphic the scenery may appear to be. His photography methods differed from traditional methods, in that traditional photographs/photographic projects were a distortion of reality, so that it is more pleasing to the audience. Smith on the other showed what was actually going on in the world or wherever he was shooting photos. His photos basically showed his audience what is happening in various parts of the world and showing people as they are living their normal lives, no matter how depressing or graphic their true lives might be. Smith changed photography, and in my opinion, opened the new world of photojournalism by telling stories with his photographs. Born to Nettie Lee Smith and Bill Smith on December 18, 1918 in Wichita, Kansas was William Eugene Smith, who would later revolutionize photography. His mother Nettie was into photography, taking photos of her family, especially her two sons as they grew up, photographing events of their lives (Hughes 2). Photography had been a part of Smith’s life since he was young. At first it started out always being photographed by his mother, and then turned into taking photographs along with his friend Pete, as he got older. They often practiced developing photos in Nettie’s kitchen, and he later began to create albums with his photographs. His photographs diff... ... middle of paper ... ...e Smith died of a stroke October 1978, a year after moving to Arizona to teach at the University of Arizona. His worked however continued to live on through his contributions to the change in photojournalism. In 1980, the W. Eugene Smith fund was founded to promote humanistic photography to carry on his legacy (Magnum Photos). This fund showed a change in the photography world due to W. Eugene Smith, and his nontraditional methods in photography. Works Cited 1- PBS: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/w-eugene-smith/about-w-eugene-smith/707/ 2- Magnum: http://www.magnumphotos.com/C.aspx?VP=XSpecific_MAG.Biography_VPage&AID=2K7O3R13EDK0 1- W. Eugene Smith: Shadow and Substance : The Life and Work of an American Photographer by Jim Hughes 2- Dream Street: W. Eugene Smith's Pittsburgh Project by Alan Trachtenberg, edited by Sam Stephenson
For Emerson, the reticent beauty of nature was the motivator. To him, photography should be recognized because its still-life beauty was able to persuade the public’s appreciation of the life and nourishment
For my museum selection I decided to attend Texas State University’s Wittliff Collection. When I arrived, there was no one else there besides me and the librarian. To be honest, I probably would have never gone to an art museum if my teacher didn’t require me to. This was my first time attending the Wittliff Collection, thus I asked the librarian, “Is there any other artwork besides Southwestern and Mexican photography?” She answered, “No, the Wittliff is known only for Southwestern and Mexican photography.” I smiled with a sense of embarrassment and continued to view the different photos. As I walked through Wittliff, I became overwhelmed with all of the different types of photography. There were so many amazing pieces that it became difficult to select which one to write about. However, I finally managed to choose three unique photography pieces by Alinka Echeverria, Geoff Winningham, and Keith Carter.
It’s his compassion for his subjects and his commitment to them that surpasses the act of making a pretty picture. Spending days with his subjects in the slums of Harlem or the hardly developed mountains of West Virginia, he immerses himself into the frequently bitter life of his next award-winning photo. Often including word for word text of testimonials recorded by junkies and destitute farmers, Richards is able to provide an unbiased portrayal. All he has done is to select and make us look at the faces of the ignored, opinions and reactions left to be made by the viewer. Have you ever been at the beach safely shielded by a dark pair of sunglasses and just watched?
The poem begins by exploring how the speaker’s grandfather was a photographer in World War One and how he turned his hobby into his job: “Opened a shop. Turned it into a family affair”. Kay then goes on to introduce the father’s speaker and how he approached photography differently: “His father knew the equipment but not the art. He knew the darks but not the brights, my father learned the magic.” By first introducing the grandfather as a character the reader can better understand the speaker’s father. Since the grandfather took pictures for the war the moments he captured through his lens were much more gruesome, whereas the speaker’s father chooses to stray from this and focus on positivity or as it’s referred to in the poem “light”. Kay then introduces the speaker’s mother, exploring her passion for photography and giving her the title of “artist”. While the grandfather turned photography into his job, the speaker’s father uses photography as a way of capturing noteworthy events, for example: “he travelled across the country to follow a forest fire, hunted it with his camera for a week.” Finally, the speaker’s mother focuses more on the artistry of photography which is seen through her focus on the use of her darkroom. By exploring each of these characters, Kay
He wanted to get his point across to other people, and photography was one of the easiest ways, because each picture was worth a thousand words and expressed more emotion than did in his writing. However, he used pictures to be the main support of his very famous novel, “How the Other Half Lives,” in which he details in writing his experiences and thoughts about tenement housing and social
In the chapter, “The Mirror with a Memory”, the authors, James Davidson and Mark Lytle, describe numerous things that evolved after the civil war, including the life of Jacob Riis, the immigration of new peoples in America, and the evolution of photography. The authors’ purpose in this chapter is to connect the numerous impacts photography had on the past as well as its bringing in today’s age.
Taking photographs may seem simple, but being a photographer is more than browsing through the viewfinder and pushing the exposure button. A photographer needs to know how to analyze the scene, speak in words that language cannot, and reach to the souls of people through a picture. During the Great Depression, many photographers captured the scenes of poverty and grief. However, there was only one photographer that truly captured the souls of Americans. According to Roy Stryker, Dorothea Lange "had the most sensitivity and the most rapport with people" (Stryker and Wood 41). Dorothea Lange was a phenomenal photographer that seized the hearts of people during the 1930s and beyond, and greatly affected the times of the Great Depression.
“Arty Pomerantz captured generations of movie stars and normal citizens—like you and me! He shot photos of real events and genuine happiness, which is hard to find in today’s generation of photographs,” said student Nathan
The photographers of the Farming Security Administration contributed to modern times both educationally and visually. Photographers like Russell Lee took photographs that not only captured the lives of those who suffered greatly with the Great Depression hovering over them, but also the emotions that these people felt. Russell Lee, like Dorothea Lange and Walker Evans found his opportunity to prosper during the Great Depression with his photographs that would document the average American life suffering the wrath of the Depression from either unemployment or lack of home or even both. ...
Lewis Hine was best remembered as a person that used his camera and photographs to bring about social change. Hine wanted to show things that had to be corrected. He called his type of photography "Interpretive Photography."
Sontag, Susan. "Essay | Photography Enhances Our Understanding of the World." BookRags. BookRags. Web. 15 Apr. 2014.
From a young age, Richard Avedon was exposed to fashion. But little did the small boy sitting in his father’s 5th Avenue womens’ clothing store know, that he would later become the worlds’ biggest fashion photographer. He was born in New York City in 1923 to Jacob Avedon a Russian immigrant who worked his way up in the city to finally own his own clothing store. Avedon’s mother, Anna, was a musical and artsy woman who was his artistic muse. His sister, Louise, was also an inspiration to him. As a child, he constantly took pictures of his beautiful sister, his first model. His interest in photography began after joining a photography club at his local Young Men's Hebrew Association. After graduating high school in 1941, Richard attended Columbia University to study philosophy and poetry, but after just one year, he dropped out to enlist in the military marines. In the marines,he was a photographer in World War Two, taking pictures for identification cards.
In conclusion, the American civil war, photographed by more than 3000 individual photographers, had a huge impact on photography, while for the most part photography played a major role throughout the course of the war. Although civil war was recorded on numerous amount of books, Photographs taken during that time frame still seems have the power of influence and most people choose to believe in photographs, since they tell a story of reality. Doesn’t matter how gruesome or unpleasant most of them look, photographs from civil tend to leave a lasting impression even on people living in the present.
Marrs, Suzanne. Eudora Welty(tm)s Photography: Images into Fiction. Critical Essays on Eudora Welty. W. Craig Turner and Lee Emling Harding. Boston, MA: G.K. Hall, 1989. 288-289.
Photojournalism plays a critical role in the way we capture and understand the reality of a particular moment in time. As a way of documenting history, the ability to create meaning through images contributes to a transparent media through exacting the truth of a moment. By capturing the surreal world and presenting it in a narrative that is relatable to its audience, allows the image to create a fair and accurate representation of reality.