OUGD401 - Photograph as a Document : Lecture Notes

William Edward Kilburn, 'The Great Chartist meeting at the common' 1848

• camera used to document
• recording an important historical event
• camera is a witness for us
• Objective record
• Visual observer Standing in the crowd
• Not commenting objectively recording

Grahame Clarke

In many contexts the notion of a literal and objective record of 'history' is a limited illusion. It ignores the entire cultural and social background against which the image was taken, just as it renders the photographer neutral, passive and invisible.

'How the other half live'

Jacob Riis

A Growler Gang in Session (Robbing a Lush),1887

Constructed image

Re-acted

Lewis Hine, Russian Steel Workers, Homestead, PA., 1908

people who have presence

Duffer Boy (1909)

• Hine never exploits the people who he is photographing
• the subject is still a person doing his job
• Does not attempt to shock the viewer

F.S.A (Farm Security Administration)

Margeret Bourke-White 'Sharecroppers Home' 1937

• the images are not seen as subjective in any way
• Sharecroppers home - temporary 
• constructed and lined with newspapers
• practical use of material - insulator 

Russel Lee 'Interior of a black farmers house' 1939

Dorothea Lange 'Migrant Mother' 1936

• Image of huge debate
• 'I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother as if like a magnet'
• She describes the treatment of the woman almost like an object
• She never asked the woman's name
• Classical Madonna and child 

George Rodger 'Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp' 1945

• retains respect
• Could have easily shown shocking images
• No exploitation
• Contrast between the young boy and the bodies by the road

Hung Cong UT 'Accidental Napalm Attack' 1972

Could be read as an anti war statement

Robert Haeberle 'People about to be shot' 1969

• override the human response to the situation
• photographer witnesses the shooting
• shouts 'hold it' so he can get the shot before they are killed
• Holts the process so he is almost implicit 

Don McCullin 'Shell Shocked Soilder' 1968

• The effect of war is the only thing left to document
•  In a way the images are a reflect of his own trauma 
• Retreats into idealised landscapes after witnessing the Viet Nam war

Documentary Exhausted

- to speak of documentary photography is to run headlong into morass of contradiction and confusion...

William Neidich (1989)

Constructing a scene which would have been impossible to photograph

Edward Curtis Native North Americans (early 20th century)1