CONTEXTUAL STUDIES: Truth in Documentary Photography
Week 3-4: 20^th Sept – 4th Oct

Can a photograph lie?

Are all photographs reliable?

A common phrase is to ‘shed light on a situation’ meaning to find out the truth.

‘A picture tells a 1000 words‘, is another aphorism that imply images are more reliable.

Picasso famously said: ‘We all know that art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realise truth.’

Magritte’s painting La Trahison des Images in which he painted a picture of a pipe with the words ‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’ (This is not a pipe) goes some way to towards an explanation.

‘The camera was there and recorded what I saw’.

A certain delivery of facts?

Claims of truth that most people take for granted?

Art or photography is not reality but can examine and model reality.

Traditional documentary believes the viewer to be a receptive subject taking in the objective information of the world through the photograph.

Documentary photography’s central aesthetic, political and moral associations are:

depicting truth

recording life as it is

camera as a witness.

TASKS: Produce a number of blog posts that show evidence of the following 

DEADLINE: Wed 4th Oct

In order to complete the tasks successfully read and look through supporting material and consider the bullit points too that may prompt you in your answers . Make notes and include direct quotes sources. Conduct independent research too .

1. RESEARCH: Look through these Powerpoints:   Photography and Truth  and Issues of truth, representation, propaganda for a historical and contemporary overview. Read also this text for further context:  Issues in Photojournalism 

Documentary photography is based on assumptions that the photograph represents a one-to-one correspondence with reality, which is nearly accurate and adequate, and that the photographic image is capable of conveying information objectively.

• Traditional documentary believes the viewer to be a receptive subject taking in the objective information of the world through the photograph
• Can we rely on its ability to capture a moment in time accurately as historical evidence or as a witness to the world?
• Postmodernism points out that all forms of representation is subjective? How? Why?
• Digital photography has made manipulation much easier?

2. ANALYSIS: Choose one image (either historical or contemporary – ppts above) that questions the notion of truth and explain why. Follow this method of analysis: Description – Interpretation  – Evaluation – Theory/Context

3. PHOTO-ASSIGNMENT: Based on your chosen themes, FAMILY or ENVIRONMENT make two images, one that you consider truthful and one that is not.

4. CASE STUDY – EXTENSION: Using current news images as an example, such as the drowned Syrian boy (read article here), consider if photographs can change the world or change people’s perception?

Here is a link to another article about the photographer who took the photos of the dead Syrian boy where she speaks about why she took them.

For a different point of view read this blog post by photographer and lecturer, Lewis Bush where he discuss the above in light of recent images of dead Syrian refugees in Europe. Incorporate his views and include quotes, for or against your own analysis and point of view.

EXTRA READING: For those of you who likes to read theory of documentary practice, see Susan Sontag (1977), On Photography , Roland Barthes (1982), Camera Lucida. John Tagg (1993) or the famous essay by conceptual artist, Martha Rosler, In, around, and afterthoughts (on documentary photography) in book: Bolton, R. (1992) ‘The Contest of Meaning’. MIT Press. See me if you are interested in reading of the above books and essays.

5. CASE STUDY – EXTENSION 2:

Kevin Carter and The Bang Bang Club

Starving Child and Vulture

Kevin Carter knew the stench of death. As a member of the Bang-Bang Club, a quartet of brave photographers who chronicled apartheid-­era South Africa, he had seen more than his share of heartbreak. In 1993 he flew to Sudan to photograph the famine racking that land. Exhausted after a day of taking pictures in the village of Ayod, he headed out into the open bush. There he heard whimpering and came across an emaciated toddler who had collapsed on the way to a feeding center. As he took the child’s picture, a plump vulture landed nearby. Carter had reportedly been advised not to touch the victims because of disease, so instead of helping, he spent 20 minutes waiting in the hope that the stalking bird would open its wings. It did not. Carter scared the creature away and watched as the child continued toward the center. He then lit a cigarette, talked to God and wept. The New York Times ran the photo, and readers were eager to find out what happened to the child—and to criticize Carter for not coming to his subject’s aid. His image quickly became a wrenching case study in the debate over when photographers should intervene. Subsequent research seemed to reveal that the child did survive yet died 14 years later from malarial fever. Carter won a Pulitzer for his image, but the darkness of that bright day never lifted from him. In July 1994 he took his own life, writing, “I am haunted by the vivid memories of killings & corpses & anger & pain.”

Read more here: http://100photos.time.com/photos/kevin-carter-starving-child-vulture

DEADLINE: Wed 4th Oct