The Document

• Documentary photography was the biggest form of photography practice in the 20th century
• The medium gained power, transcended painting as supposedly captures the truth
• It is believed to be objective
• There was the idea was that photographic evidence is neutral and not to be questioned
• But also the idea that the photography was to document for the purpose of changing the world, to record and relay information
• Camera with a conscious - not just there to record but to expose (James Nachtwey)
• Because everyone can't see the pain of war, photography is there to show them images
• Here the photographer is not disinterested, is not invisible, but instead is making a stance, being overtly subjective with a political humanist agenda. He is attempting to expose war the benefit of humanity. He is struggling for the people, which gets rid of the idea of photography being neutral
• The world is being closed in on itself by showing how the 'other' half live through photography
• Bonds are created between subject, audience and photographer
• The photographer seeks to align, and to make the viewer feel empathy
• In this photograph by Kilburn, he has stood higher than the scene to take the photograph, as if he is removed, and this is just a neutral image. These photographs become our only knowledge of certain events, and so become our history
• In comparison, Nachtwey got right it on the action in his photographs
• Henri Cartier Bresson took photographs of everyday life, however these were highly constructed for aesthetic value - For example, the man and his shadow are mimicking the movements of the dancer on the poster
• As he has already planned the photograph, it is more than just a record, but art, however, the images still seem to be neutral and aesthetic
• This poses the question "How much should documentary photography be concerned with aesthetic - does this make it unreal?"
• Jacob Riis was a social campaigner who photographed squalor and poverty, but it is as if he had a hidden agenda
• His photography was used in a book which allowed the rich, with their morbid curiosity, to spy on the poor
• The photograph is not like the invisible eye, instead, these images are superficial as they are set up and the people in them are posing
• In the photographs there is a struggle as the images are neither about how people project their sense of self or how the photographer depicts their sense of self
• This photograph of a robbery is staged - Riis bribed street kids to act in a certain way for an interesting image. This is not a real depiction but an artificial representation of the other
• Lewis Hine was a social campaigner who showed the plight of the immigrant workers, wanting for humanity and empathy
• A photographer can stamp their representation on people or aim to get the peoples image of themselves out to the world
• Project FSA was a government campaign to combat social crisis. Images were taken to be used as an emotive lobbying tool
• This was a controversial project as the photographers had an agenda as they were instructed what to take and how to do this so that the images would be emotive in every way
• These photographs are not neutral documents
• The image of the boy and the dog in the newspaper advertisement covered shelter shows how the advertisement culture was surrounding poverty
• The photographers had to send their negatives back to the government so couldn't destroy the images that they didn't like, some weren't used as considered too confrontational
• Composition tries to draw similarities with the classical art images of Madonna and child
• The subjects were arranged like actors
• Another photograph that wasn't used was a farmer with his children, as this is not the image the government was to project - a starving farmer who has five children
• Some photographs were used as a reminder of our own mortality. The image of the factory and the graveyard with the houses in between reminds that we work, live and then die
• In the Victorian Era, photography was about power, used to compare and contrast the 'other' with us. A tool for scrutinising, classifying and documenting. This agenda of trying to justify that black people are inferior to white people was disguised as a scientific pursuit
• The 'Mass Observation' project was an attempt to develop a neutral democratic record of the working class. As it was a shared vision, as the working class were allowed to send in diaries and images of their everyday life, it could be seen as a more accurate document of the world
• War and conflict photographs are horrifying but show striking images of human experience
• Blurring becomes an aesthetic style for one artist - becomes known as the Capa shudder - which represents the drama
• The Magnum group are a collaborative network that photograph sights of struggle. They believe in internationalism and record work for humanity
• All photographers have a style, an aesthetic, and their own way to represent their world
• Images of immense power, such as the photograph which was took a moment before the death of the people involved, spark up a moral question - should you intervene? These photographs are taken with the desire to show horror to someone else in the hope of change