The Document

Joseph Nicephore Niepce took what is considered the first ever photograph. 'View From a Window at La Gras'.

James Nachtwey is a documentary photographer who is noted for documenting war. he is quoted saying - "I have been a witness and these virtues are my testimony. The events I have recorded must not be forgotten and must not be repeated."

Frances Firth - 'Entrance to the Great Temple' where photographers go against generic documentation as the image depicts an Egyptian temple the way the Western eye would like to see it

Photographers capture reality. They do not effect the image themselves. This capture of reality records the history and events with a reason. Neutral photography capture is a myth.

The Decisive Moment

Photography achieves its highest distinction - reflecting the universality of the human condition in a never-to-be retrieved fraction of a second.

Does photography's concern with aesthetics question the validity of a photograph as a document?

JACOBS RIIS (1888) - 'Bandits Roost' is a constructed photograph which depicts people in the slum who are very much aware of the photographers presence. However, it is still a document of life back them. But is it really? Riis has set up a middle class fantasy of lower class life in the slums. This method of construction questions the validity of documentation. Riis even used to bribe his poor subjects with cigarettes and such things to pose for him.

LEWIS HINE was a sociologist in terms of photography. He had left wing beliefs and photographed the working class to glorify them. There was no personal gain involved.

ROY STRYKER helped found the program.

It was during the American depression when 11 million people were unemployed.

Mass migration of farmers. The 'Oakies' from Oklahoma and the 'Arkies' from Arkansas.

The photograph was used as both photojournalism and an emotive tool as photographers were hired to document the goings on of the time.

Photographers were given instructions of what to record. The reality of what was to be recorded had been pre-determined.

MARGARET BOURKE-WHITE - 'Sharecroppers Home' (1937) is a depiction of abject poverty. However, the image has very clear compositional decisions such as the newspaper advertisements on the wall and the dog with the boy.

DOROTHEA LANGE - 'Migrant Mother' (1936) depicts a migrant mother in a contemplative mood which questions the future. However, the composition is highly referencing old fine art. The image is not objective due to its compositional nature. The photographs were meant to persuade the middle and upper classes to help these people. The composition is highly effective in terms of the subjectivity of the image.

The FSA wanted images of depression and helplessness. This is why several photographs that all the photographers took were rejected. They did not show it effectively enough.

WALKER EVANS - 'Graveyard, Houses & Steal Mill, Bethlehem Pennsylvania' communicates work, life, then death. It is just as composed as Dorothea Lange's images of the migrant mother.

Photography was developed as supposed empirical evidence such as in 1868 where JOHN LAMPREY photographed different races of people in order to prove that some races of people were less well defined than others.

Lots of pseudo-scientific photographs were taken in the past such as CESARE LOMBROSO's - 'Portrait of Melancholy' where he took photos lots of depressed people's faces and compared them to try and formulate a sole 'melancholic face'.His work was even tried out as an objective mean to prove something when he tried to prove what a criminals face looked like. His work on this was even used as evidence in genuine court cases.

WAR/CONFLICT PHOTOGRAPHY

ROBERT CAPA - 'Normandy, France' (1945)

MAGNUM GROUP - Founded in 1947 by Robert Capa and Henri Cartier Bresson.

To what extent does the staging of historically documented images question their legibility as a factual document? This is questioned in Robert Capa's 'Falling Soldier' which was supposedly captured just as Capa and a soldiers were drinking when the soldier was shot.

DON MCCULLAN (1968) - 'Shell Shocked Soldier'. McCullin was banned from the Falklands by the British government as they did not want shocking images of the Falklands war displayed to people.

ROBERT HAEBERLE (1969) captured Vietnamese people who were literally about to get massacred and gunned down by American soldiers. Why did he do this? Perhaps to suggest the notion of powerlessness to most people in controlling death in war.

WILLIAM KLEIN - 'St. Patrick's Day'. Klein used to push people and get in their way photographing them in the process. The photographer influences the photo questioning the objective truth of the image.

CONCEPTUAL ART

JEFF WALL (1992) - 'Dead Troops Talk'. A document of the Russia and Afghanistan war. It is digitally altered.

GILLIAN WEARING - 'Signs That Say What You Want Them To Say'

JEREMY DELLER (2001) - 'Battle of Orgreave' references the British civil war to communicate the severity of the miners strike as this is what it depicts. Perhaps this is more legible it terms of objective documentation.

Nowadays anyone has the power of documentation with camera phones and cameras available to all. For example, a passer by captured a photo of the man who was killed at a G8 Summit protest.

KEY FEATURES OF DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY

Offers a humanitarian perspective.

portray political

Has the purpose to be objective to portray the facts of a certain situation.

People tend to form the subject matter.

Images are straightforward, to the point and not manipulated.