"Photography is a form of documentation, document means to
evidence, photography as documentation functions as evidence for events."
In this lecture we were told a brief history of Documentary
photography themes and traditions. These include
• images of the working class and records of poverty in the
US and the UK from the 1800’s to the 1950’s.
•Reporting and war both in Europe and during the Vietnam
war. •Photographing ‘other’ cultures – documents of travel and conquest •The
concept of the decisive moment
•The recognition of an ‘always constructed’ document
The lecture seeks to dispel the myth of ‘the medium of
truth’ and to recognise the guises of construction in documentary photography
from the beginnings of photography to the present day. In doing so it
recognises that rather than asserting that ‘there is no truth’, Postmodern
photography can acknowledge that truths are constructed though a multiple of
viewpoints and that this is the function of the camera today. "
"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 recorder of the
scene."~ Clarke: 1997:145
"How the Other Live" is a written and visual
account of New York by Jacob Riss in 1890, revealing cultural ideologies of
ethnicity, poverty and 'the other side'. Riss used this as a tool for social
reform, but hypocritically, made a lot of money, yet in one of the
photographers paid the men in cigarettes, therefore defeating the point of
natural documentation. Photography used through educational purposes, often in
these cases they are poorly staged and posing occurs, placing the middle class
in a negative light.
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