Q1: When technology makes it so easy to manipulate images, how much manipulation is acceptable?
Manipulation is accepted in many different forms and styles of photography. Changing the contrast and brightness are the very basics of manipulating photos, but Photoshop and other digital software there is no limit to what you’re able to achieve. Working with styles such as archival photography and landscape photography, need to either adjust the image is still going to be needed. But when working with the style of documentary photography which Steve McCurry shoots, the need for digital manipulation should not be over used and abused. As his work shows the beauty in Eastern countries, but many of his images is not a realist perspective on those countries. In recent months McCurry has been editing different elements such as a “sign post” in the images, and then wrongly adjusting the images which he has then worked hard to achieve. This one fault has then led to further investigation into Steve McCurry’s work. Yet as an audience we are unaware of the intentions of this sign post, McCurry may have been wanting to makes the yellow in the image brighter, as McCurry’s work has always shown and the need to keep his reputation of showing the Eastern countries and beautiful and rich in colour. But this is not the true, using documentary photography should mean you’re capturing events happening there and then, not having staged images, but the need for having perfect, colourful images highlights that appearance is prioritised over the ethics of the images. So manipulation is acceptable if doing certain images which need the digital manipulation due to the vision of that photographer. But the style of work Steve McCurry the least amount of digital manipulation should be used. As his images should reflect a real representation of the place of the image. Using Photoshop to gain that “perfect” and “aesthetically pleasing” images should come second because the photographer should be wanting to show the beauty of lifestyle, culture and lives of the people in these countries.
Q2: With viewers more sophisticated and skeptical than ever before, how can photojournalists and documentary photographers preserve their integrity and maintain trust?
Now with the scandal of one of the best and well established photographers getting criticized for digitally manipulating recent images must have others on edge if they too have edited in such great ways, such as removing a child from and image. Maintaining their reputation, photojournalist and documentary photographers need to stay true to their morals and represent the real world and not a “perfect” world. Shooting in the Eastern countries such as India, Bangladesh and Thailand all these countries are brutally struck with poverty yet many documentary photographers glamorize those countries which are rich in colour, culture and religion. So by staying true to what they are photographing what their eyes actually see. The risk also of their reputation being at stake can also be a major factor to the change in the way critiques see things. With the need to show genuine documentary images of countries which the Western world is not exposed too, photojournalism and documentary photography can all those to be transported into their world. Yet there is the risk of glamorization of their culture. So maintaining their status as a trusted photographer the ability to present the truth, yet their is always the desire to present this world in colourful light. But realistically it is a beautiful place with different people but their are the real issues which are facing different countries.
Q3: Who sets the boundaries of what defines photojournalism or documentary ethics?
I think that the founders of documentary photography and photojournalism set the boundaries of what defines ethics or more importantly society and what we consider to be acceptable. i have this belief because they did not have the software that we have today when editing our images and did not have the ability to manipul. Originally if images did not come out perfect photographers would not have had the option to manipulateaspects in that image, due to the software not having the eraser or clone tool. The images were genuine and may of only had the basic adjustments to improve the lighting or to crop the image. Their images would of been able to express the true representation of what is going on in that current event. Documentary is needed to document a event either big or small, so the ability to capture it using the camera, there should be no need to digitally manipulate.
How is McCurry’s images different compared to Singh in the way that they represent Indian culture?
Representation is the way in which a particular person or thing is portrayed. therefore in photography the was something is presented is usually down to the artist an how the are capturing the image. Particular subject or focal points in photography are usually seen in different ways as every photographer has a different style and represents what they see it as in their minds eye. Different representations of a person for example can either show them in documentary form where they are being compleatly natural and themselves or can be fashion photography and the individuals purpose has now compleately changed as they are being represented in a different light.
India is rich with life, culture and colour. People often think of India as the colourful, scented land of beauty and and wonder and represent it in a positive light, however it can be a place which can be represented quite the opposite if you look past the obvious beauty. Poverty engulfs the country and the rich culture which it once possessed is fading in the fight for survival as the poverty situation does not get any better. Nonetheless India is a place of morals in a time of Westernization. A land where humanity presents itself in the most dizzying, creative burst of culture and religions, races and tongues. The oldest civilization, and yet the youngest. The epitome of wisdom and yet modest. A place impossible to not be astonished by. Photographers approaches to the indian culture have varied over the past century. Often showing either the ‘picture perfect’ image of indian vibrancey and traditional ways which make whats seems like the perfect vision or a more realistic style of photojournalism which documents the countries culture in the more naturalistic way. In my opinion there is right or wrong to represent the indian culture unless it is a lie because it depends on what the photographer intends to portray.
Local Indian Photograper Raghubir Singh captures Indian culture as a form of documentation. Singh belongs to a tradition of small-format street photography, pioneered by photographers like Henri Cartier-Bresson he developed a certain sophistication to his work where he was able to represent his home land in its natural form. Through travelling around the world with various photographers spending most of his time capturing the indian culture he built his own style and aesthetic imprint. His images neither sugarcoated the culture nor showed ever aspect of the reality of the culture. The thoughtful composition of his works create natural fluency throughout the images which make them asthetically pleasing however informative in showing the culture of india. In Raghubir Singh’s represents the culture in a realistic light showing the richness of the culture but not in a way that seem overly staged and dramatized. He seems to focus on the method of the decisive moment which was influenced by his time spent with Henri Cartier-Bresson. This is the moment which occurs when the visual and psychological elements of people in a real life scene spontaneously and briefly come together in perfect resonance to express the essence of that situation. This therefore emphasizes that Singh represents India as he sees it in that very moment, he captures the natural beauty of the community and doesn’t attempt to formalise the situation to be something that it is not.
I Raghubir Singh
Steve McCurry represents indian culture in a very different light. His modern and conceptual style of photography highlights the different representation that he shows the indian culture as. Similarly to Singh, he captures everyday moments of india and documents the essence of what makes the country so beautiful, however it can be considered that he over staged and falsifies his images into a way that they do not represent the truth of indian culture.
Steve McCurry
In the article “A Too Perfect Picture” Teju Cole in reference to world known photographer steve McCurrys photographs in a negative light stating that, “The pictures are staged or shot to look as if they were. They are astonishingly boring.” This is a very strong personal opinion, which i myself disagree on, however McCurrys work has been widely criticised for being “too perfect”. Cole highlights that McCurrys iconic images represent Indian culture in a very specific, in almost an exaggerated and falsified manner. He uses bold, vibrant colours with “crisp composition”. Cole goes on to discuss why McCurrys photographs are so popular and he comes to the conclusion that it is due to the fact that his photographs “because they evoke an earlier time in Indian history, as well as old ideas of what photographs of Indians should look like, what the accouterments of their lives should be: umbrellas, looms, sewing machines; not laptops, wireless printers, escalators. ” Cole explores some interesting interpretations of McCurrys work and highlights that the way in which he captures photography may not capture the current culture in India but focus on the old ways of their culture as it produces near to perfect images as they are thoughtfully composed and contain a sense of beauty through the colour and use of wide eyes he captures in his image. His work has been criticized for not portraying the issues of India in the current world and lacking a sense of reality to his imagery.
Nonetheless other articles such as ‘In defense of Steve McCurry‘, argue in defense of his photography, ALLEN MURABAYASHI begins his article with dismissing the accusation that McCurry stages his photographs and goes on to state that he is a talented photography that possess incredible skill in the photographic world to create mesmerizing images which tell true stories. Cole seems to favour Sighn’s photography as he adopts a street photography style documenting everyday life on the street, which to many may seem more natural. However due to McCurrys clever composition and persistence to take around 250,000 images in the course of a 3- month assignment he is able to capture almost perfect images because he spends the time searching for individuals and situations that create beautiful story telling images.
“Cole’s point of view is also a bit of historical criticism with a contemporary lens. McCurry’s Afghan Girl is one of the most iconic and recognizable images of the 20th century. To suggest in the 21st century that it is somehow a vacuous, staged image is spurious. McCurry helped define a style of photojournalistic portraiture that Cole finds objectionable.”
The way a photography may represent a situation, culture, event, individual does not distinguish whether the image is real or has been subject to objectivity. All photographers are evident to some subjectivity as they are placing the camera in a certain position to capture the image they seen in their minds eye. This means that all photographers are going to see subjects in a different manner and therefore are likely to represent them in a different way depending on personal preference. McCurry and Sighn are just two examples of photojournalist who represent indian culture in different ways, neither necessarily fake or untrue but just adopting different styles of photography and exploring different aspects of indian culture.
We are involved in a gallery exhibition linked with Archisle called ‘ constructive narratives’. i have selected a few of my images which i think relates family and environment the most. The 6 images below that i have picked show a selection of child environmental portraits which i have captured. The images all link together showing the sense of community in third world countries and emphasise the maturity of these young people. Most of the images where taken on the building site we were working on having the meaning that they were all willing to get stuck into the project that was taking place and how they, no matter what there age wanted to be a part of developing their community and learning how to build and cook so they can transfer these skills to supporting there family and community as a whole. i refined my choice of images specifically down to images where and the subjects show strong stances and a straight facial expression and highlighting a way in which they are mature fore their age. In the top image the young girl is wearing shoes which are far too big for her, this is symbolic of how she is having to grow up quickly and step into the shoes of responsibility and look out for herself and possibly her family. In the second image we see a boy of 13 years old, he stands with his arms crossed and the low angle looking up at him implies he has become a grown up and could possibly be the man of the household if the dad is not around. This idea runs throughout all the images linking them all together to be a series of powerful portraits
Experimenting with layout:
I printed out a few different images and experimented with different sizes and different image combinations however none of the photos seemed to fit together to tell a powerful story. I decided that instead of trying to show one photo from all the different shoots i did, id just focus on one shoot and then save and the others for when i make a book which will combine all the series of photograph i have captured together. I therefore looked at my environmental portraiture shoot to experiment with layouts and combinations which worked, my final choices are shown below.
Below is how i am going to have my images layed out in the exhibition. They will all be in colour and in A3 so that you can see the images clearly. The way they have been placed has been thought through as the outer images all contain a subject which is facing slightly inwards, this has the impact that it is grouping the images together emphasising the link between the images and highlighting the community atmosphere. Although they are portraits of them standing alone looking independent the grouping of the images shows that they are not alone and that they are a community and one big family and working together to help each other out.
A State of Contentment – Zoe Pannenborg
A State of Contentment is a series of portraits captured in Burkina Faso. In October I participated in a foreign aid project to Burkina Faso where I was surrounded by the local’s culture, natural beauty and sense of community. After spending 2 weeks photographing the children and that surrounded us on the building site every day, it was noticeable that even though they had so little every single one of them was full of energy and beaming with happiness, as if they were in a state of contentment. Inspired by the works of Gideon Mendel and Steve McCurry I have created my own photojournalistic style of capturing the community spirit the environment offered. This series of conceptual portraits show the maturity that the local children possess and that with so little they can be so content.
Steve McCurry and Gideon Mendel are both highly recognised photographers for their environmental images capturing third world countries through there conceptual portraits and photo journalistic photographs. In the top two images are a more environmental portrait from both of my inspirational artists. Differences and similarities are seen in both these images as they may focus on similar subjects and messages to focus their photography on but the acual way in which they capture this images varies in terms of the techniques used and the conceptual theme in the image or a more theoretical way of showing third world countries. A similarity which is noticable in these two image is that they have focused on a wider angle of shot to capture a wider range of subjects, this may have the intention of showing the community spirit that is event in locations such as those that mendel and McCurry capture. Another similarity is that the use of colour is very important in both photographers work. the bright, vibrant colour tones use in both photographers work highlights the vibrancy of the third world countries cultures. However many differences can be noticed between these two images for example Mendels image is a strong form of documentary photography, it is noticeable that he has placed himself in a natural position and captured image of things which were occurring in that time and place without planning or adjusting what was actually happening. this is highlighted by the fact the lady is not looking directly at the camera. However McCurrys photography takes a very different approach. hi image still tells a story of community and culture however it is in a more tableaux style of photography. he has clearly times the photograph to capture the moment that he wants and everything seems to be in perfect position as well as the subjects in the photograph looking at the camera suggests they new it was being taken and are focusing on it therefore not showing their natural train journey. however both are very strong images in different ways and i will attempt to capture both of these styles of photography when i go to Africa and do similar shoots showing community spirit.
Portraits
Steve McCurry
Gideon Mendel
These two images both take a slightly different approach to the previous images. Both of these images are portraits of young children however they show messages in different ways and i find analysing and comparing these images are giving me lots of influence, inspiration and my own ideas for the style of images that i wan to capture on my trip. McCurrys image highlights an environmental photographers style of portrait. the photograph does have the focal point of a young child and there face is clear and are looking at the camera,however the image also contains the background which shows the location they are in making it helpful to decide where they’ve possibly grown up and tells us a little about the subject of the image. On the other hand Mendel takes a more conceptual style of portrait and captures a straight on angle of this young girl. This simple but effect portrait is also linked to a small piece of writing which tells us about the subject of the image. This shows a very modern form of portrait and i really like the idea of speaking the the community after i have photographed them to find out their name and a little but more about them to add depth and knowledge to my images.
Steve McCurry is an American editorial photographer. McCurry focuses on the human consequences of war, not only showing what war impresses on the landscape, but rather, on the human face. Although McCurry shoots both in digital and film, his admitted preference is for transparency film. Steve McCurry has been one of the most iconic voices in contemporary photography for more than thirty years, with scores of magazine and book covers, over a dozen books, and countless exhibitions around the world to his name. He always retains the human element that made his celebrated image of the ‘Afghan Girl’ such a powerful image. McCurry has been recognized with some of the most prestigious awards in the industry, including the Robert Capa Gold Medal, National Press Photographers Award, and an unprecedented four first prize awards from the World Press Photo contest.
I like Steve McCurry’s photographs because he takes photos of real life situations. I like his style of street photography because it is not just of happy people in a perfect life situation, his photos capture the hard life and the poverty that people have in countries around the world, giving his photos a lot of meaning behind them. I also like the vibrant colours and huge tonal range that he captures in his photography . Some of his images make me feel sad because the situations some of the children are in is quite sad. However a lot of his other photos make me feel happy because the people are genuinely smiley and look like they are having fun. After looking at McCurry’s photographs I would like to apply to my own photography capturing natural photos that have not been planned to take. I would also like to apply the tonal range he uses in his photos when I go out and take photos.
Photo Analysis
This image of a young boy can be seen as an environmental portrait as the image captures both a portrait as well as the location/environment which is going on in the background. The difference between this and just a portrait is that it tells us a little bit more about the story behind the image, we can pick out key elements which act as clues to the narrative of the photography. For example in this image we can see that they are in a simplistic location due to the background being open and bare. The colours and tones used in the photograph also give us clues to the message of the image. The natural colours and earthy tones really tuck out to me in this image highlighting that they are close with the earth and that they mainly rely on natural elements and resources that are in their surroundings. this can be taken to tell a wider story that they are not materialistic people. however the dull tones in the background could be starting to highlight harshness of their life. it is noticeable that the subject is a boy living in poverty most lively in a third world countries such as Africa so the dull tones may show that he is having a tough life.
Id consider this image to both follow and break the rule of thirds. the young boy, which is the focal point of the image is in the centre of the image which may break the rule of thirds however the other outer aspects of the image are also kept to the outer axis which may show that the artist has purposely broken the rule of thirds so that the image is noticeably broken up into the three main sections which tell us about the message to the photograph. Leading lines has been used in the image in the background where the land meets the sky is makes a deffinaite separation between land and sky showing the different colour tones in the image. the mothers arms which are holding the focal point of the portrait can also be consider as creating leading lines as her arms lead your eyes from the top of the image down to the subject keeping your eye on the focal point but also leading you around the image at the same time. The eye level view point as has a lot of potential depth and meaning to it. I portray this eye level technique as the photographer trying to make us feel equal with the subject neither is looking up or down at each other. This could implie that the photographer considers equality a very important message which he wants to convey through his photographs of third world countries.
The mixture of the use of technical aspects of the camera such as the changing of the aperture and ISO have created a distinct depth of field which brings the subject into clear focus in the fore ground and places the environment in the background as blurred. This helps to highlight what the subject is whilst still showing the environment in the background of the image. With this technique the background is not taking away from the image but adding depth to it. The out of focus background can also act as framing to the portrait always keeping your eye on the main focus of the image.
The image has most likely been digitally manipulated so that the image has a higher contrast making the tonal range varied including tones from pure white to pure black, giving again the image a sense of depth and realness. The lighting is a soft light therefore there are no definite shadows created on the subject. however there is enough soft light possible created by clouds over the sun which keep the exposure low enough that the facial features are noticeable and with the slight contrast, compliments the strong and power facial expression which the young boy has.
Gideon Mendel is a world wide known photographer, who is recognized for his contemporary photographs focusing and engaging his work on social issues which are of global concern. His is a committed photographer to taking an intimate style of photography, which shows his long term commitment to his love of photography and the projects that he emerges himself in. He has completed an enormous amount of social issues project around the world many which have earned him international recognition and many awards, including the Pollock prize for creativity.
The self motivated photographer was born in Johannesburg in 1959 and studied psychology and African history, so therefore not always showing the greatest interest in photograph from a young age. However he did began to take photographs around the 1980’s where his work as a ‘struggle photographer’ where first brought to the attention. After this he moved around and continued to photograph global social issues and one of his most notable being his project into HIV/AIDs, which had a very hard hitting impact of general public because it was showing true harshness of society in struggling countries. His photo taken began in Africa and expanded to many different locations around the world capturing stories of hardship and global social issues which have made his photographs so famous and popular today.
In 2007, he began his project ‘ the drowning world’ photographing flooding in an emotional and personal project responding the the current situation of climate change. He has been recognised for his unusual portraits and awarded for his creativity and different strategies he takes to produce his story telling images. Following his extensive career capturing global social issues he has worked with many organisations such as National geographic, fortune and the guardian etc.this emphasises the vast amount of work he has done on this topic and shows that he is a professional reliable photographer, which is truthful to the images he captures.
Four stories of hunger is an incredible short film produce by Mendel which shows video clips and images from some of his projects. this short film that he created adds depth and reality to his images and brings more of a story and excitement to the images which often captivates the audience more, and this is one of the aspects which made Mendel stand out as a photographer that inspired me and that i wanted to analyse and have influence in my project which i am conducting in Africa. I was inspired by his passion and long term commitment for photographing social issues and believe that the work that want to capture whilst i am in Burkina Faso shows strong links to the work of Mendel. I personally really like the contemporary style of photography that he uses to capture his images, from the way that he conducts his portraits getting an individual to stand infront of a plain wall can often be difficult and even more so if they speak a different language. Therefore i appreciate his images as they seem as though they are simplistic images however getting to the stage where that image can be taken with the right lighting and position of the camera takes skill and experience.
Image Analysis
Eunice Achieng, age 8 project: Disability reframed
The first thing which noticeable when analysing Gideon Mendel work is that he has a project title for all of his shoots which immediately tell you about what the images are of and also where they are taken, meaning in which part of the world and the specific social issue which is being targeted. Without even seeing the image above i already new that the project was focused on in africa and that the project title was ‘Disability Reframed’. From this i started to pick out what he was gong to be capturing in his images and you can assume that it was going to be focusing on how the third world deal and cope with disability. therefore when you click onto the project mendel gives you information about the project, often statistics and background information to the story the project is telling. I think that this is the feature which makes Mendels work stand out from other photojournalist as he is putting raw facts and information behind his images, emphasising that these images are truthful and are telling the stories of global social issues.
The image is of a young girl with some form of disability. She is standing in the middle of the shot therefore making her the focal point of the image. The photograph has no significant distracting background from the image so all focus is on this little girl and wht er story may be. The image breaks the rule of thirds following Mendels contemporary approach to photography and breaks the rule of thirds through the way that the young girl is placed perfectly in the center of the image with an even amount of gap above and below her head. this contemporary form of photographing portraits creates a sense of unusuality which may be a connotation for the fact that he is photographing children with disability which is seen as unique. The series of photos sees every child photographed together in the same way and this could emphasis a sense of community or belonging as they are all photographed in the same way the images are portraying equality which these children may not be used to experiencing because they do not get the same schooling opportunities as other children. Another element of the photograph that i noticed is the angle that the image is taking the photo at. The straight on camera shot that Mendal uses could also be used to portray equality as they are at the same level, the camera is level with the subjects eye.
The background of the image although being plain, is extremely important in the image as it makes the subject stand out more against the background. the neutral colours could also be signifying the simpleness of third world countries lives. And the the use of bold vibrant colored clothing gives a personality and a sense of life to the individual. each portrait in the project the individuals have different coloured clothing and i think that is what signify there individuality and uniqueness. Framing is also a key aspect to this image as the background frames the young girl making her the center point of the image, this is a technique which i am going to use when i am in Africa taking similar portrait images showing the stories of their community. I thin that if i use Mendel’s technique of photographing against a plain wall then the personality of the individual and their story will be the main focus of the image and this will show contrast to maybe other more environmental portraits which i will capture.
The image below is a good example however of how much variation Mendel includes throughout all of his different projects. This portrait although very similar in the stance of the subject and the use of the bright coloured clothing that emphasises their individuality has a very different element to it. Th background of the portrait below shows blurred out the woman’s house. This begins to tell a deeper story of who the individual is. For example in the image below i can pick out that this woman may be a house wife, who stays in the home most of the day looking after the children. Therefore this is a different approach to documentary portraiture which i would also like to explore more and have a go at in my own personal investigation.
By researching all the different projects which mendel has thrown himself into with his love of photography i feel extremely inspired to take some of his ideas and techniques of portraying stories of family and community through social issues and use it to influence my own style of photography and capture images similar. Main points that i want to take away from looking at mendel,is the idea of producing a short film to advertise, or show a deeper story to the images that i will be taking, after my research i am considering the types of video clips that i want to capture whilst im away as well as how i can link in interviews with the local community to show there story and what family means to them.
From previous projects i have found that a lot of my ideas, inspiration and final pieces have come from researching on Instagram, pinterest and looking at books for images that stand out to me. i began looking for inspiration on the styles of images that linked to environmental documentary photography and the idea of third world issues on the internet just googling photographers which have photographed social/cultural issues. I began to come across a variety of images which started to inspire me and widen my imagination and understanding of photojournalism ad capturing images in these harsh environments which have powerful connotations and stories behind them. Below are a few initial photographers i have come across:
Gideon Mendel
Steve McCurry
Guy Martin
Alec Soth
Guy Tillim
David Goldblatt
Panos Pictures
Sebastiao Salgado
Florent Mazzoleni
These photographers are a mixture of professional photojournalists, amateur photographers as well as local African photographers. I’m purposefully looking at a variety of photographers with different experience and styles to inspire me as much as possible so my head is full of ideas of the types of photographs i want to create. As i am also in africa on the aid trip for a significant amount of time i will have lots of time where i will be able to capture photograph with different shoots focusing on different aspects. However with looking at different leveled photographers i am noticing significant differences with the quality of the images and it is becoming apparent that some images are more manipulated and staged than others. Steve McCurry produces some of my all time favorite environmental portraits however he is becoming to be known as a photographer which puts propaganda use above the truth of his images. This is something i want to avoid in my images. Although i may end up planning and staging individuals in specific areas, this will be truthful and with the purpose to create good photographs. Documentary and the truth has become a huge topic of discussion when it comes to social issues including both wars and poverty. A question is left over many archival images of what is the truth anf the reasons why they have been adapted. is it to cover up something, exaggerate and use the image for propaganda reasons or just to make it a better photo.
The story behind the famous image may not always be as it seems. Many famous images of tragedy, loss and pain often have an even deeper and more sorry story underneath, but sometimes the story does not always portray the truth. One photograph which changed the view of millions of Americans during the Vietnam war was an imaged captured on the 8th of June by Nick Ut. His award winning photograph portrayed the terror which the war was bringing to innocent civilians. The image, showing young children fleeing from a napalm bomb which had just been dropped on a small village in Vietnam, shows the true horror of the events that were occurring during the war. in the center of the image Nick Ut captures with his camera a year old girl running from the explosion as her clothes have been burnt off by the gas and her skin is being burnt as she runs from her village, terrified. Ever since this image was released she has been known as the ‘Napalm girl’. The extraordinary photograph which i can only assume Ut captures by chance of being in the moment at the right time shows the destruction of the napalm bomb which was deployed from the US warplanes.
The image had the biggest impact of american citizens who were utterly shocked by what their country was doing to these innocent children and therefore changed the way Americans viewed the was which was occurring at the time. Nonetheless their thoughts has already been changing and in October 1967 ‘46% of responded to the survey said it was a mistake to send troops to Vietnam’. Whereas in 1965, only 24% believed that it was a mistake to send US troops. With a 22% increasing in Americans believing that American troops should of not been sent to Vietnam. When Ut took the image in 1972, in 1971 61% believed it was a mistake to send US troops to Vietnam. The war ended in April 19745, three years after the Napalm girl had been captured and shown to the world. There is a myth associated with the photograph that it was in fact the image itself which hastened the Vietnamese war to an end, no the less this is thought to also not be the case as Americans were no longer involved in the war by 1973.
The truth behind the image and what really happened to the ‘Napalm Girl’, is that she suffered third degree burns which covered 30% of her body. Significantly Ut who captured the image was actually the one to take the young girl to the hospital where she was then transferred to a facility in america where she was to recieve life saving treatment.
The impact which the image captured showed that the war was inflicting more harm than good. The destruction which occurred due to the conflict between Vietnam and America undercuts the horror which had to be endured by many innocent civilians. The image found it difficulty in publishing as to the AP policy of showing nudity. As explicit content was unable to shown in many magazines in America. The AP of Saigon said to Nick Ut after developing the image “We don’t think we can use the picture in the paper, because she’s too naked.” Later the image was sent to New York who published this image on the front of the magazines as well as having it published over the television. This lead to an uproar of protesting in America, Japan London Paris,m the main protest happened outside the White house, Washington DC.
Questions began to emerge, one of which was from the American president Nixon who proceeded to question whether the image was fake. Nick Ut the photographer of the image replied with “the horror of the Vietnam war recorded by me did not have to be fixed”, emphasizing that the image was truthful to what it was showing and there had been no manipulation to the image the true horror of the events are shown through the truth of the image.
‘Napalm Girl’ 40 years after the image was taken
There are many images that have been documented over the years that have had their purposes questioned for if they were truthful. I chose to research and study this particular image as i felt that it had significance to my personal investigation, as it is all about showing the truth of tragedy around the world. therefore i was interested in studying this photograph because i had heard about it before but never really researched it enough to have an opinion on the topic. I didn’t know much about the american influence on the war going on in Vietnam and thought this would be a good opportunity to look deeper into the events which occurred. Whats so shocking about the events which occurred are that the Americans were the one to bring to horror to these innocent villagers. The bomb which was released had horrific consequences including many deaths of innocent young and old people living in the Vietnamese village which was brutally targeted. It is known that the impacts of chemical warfare are truly horrid to both the people and the environment. The reaction that Americans showed when it was released that this was what american troops were deploying shows how horrified they were as people were saying it was fake. This emphasizes the disgrace people had that this was happening as they didnt want to believe that it was true.
After reading this interview with Nick Ut, it is obvious and clear that the horrific images that he both saw and captured that day are the ultimate truth and maybe people didn’t want to believe it because it was so horrific. “The girl was running all naked, and when she passed me, I saw her left arm burned and her the skin peeling off her back. I immediately thought that she was going to die. She was very hot even after the bomb. She was screaming and screaming, and I thought, “Oh my God.” That’s when I stopped taking pictures of her.” The that Ut captures is only a snapshot of the story he has to tell that goes with it and during the interview where he talks about how he felt when he realised what was truly happening before him highlights the truth of the image and that this was an unavoidable true tragedy which did happen.
The photograph is a form of documentary photography as it was taken purely in the moment and nothing was staged about this image except maybe where the photographer placed himself. The image itself is a snapshot of the emotion and action of the events which occurred during the war. the image really portrays the fear which young children must have been going through. In relation to documentary and the truth in photography, this is a truthful image of what these children where really experiences and that there was no escape for them from this harsh reality. This was also a way for Nick Ut to show to America the devastation which is occurring in Vietnam. As well showcase the fear which many innocent civilians would of been experiencing. The fact that the young girl was able to receive life changing surgery so she can live , allows her to authenticate the image which was taken.
In my previous post i researched the differences that foreign aid can have and how when you split it up into government and non government organisations you can see the differences which emerge between how much they actually help. I came to the opinion that non government organisations although they don’t have the ability to make a differences on a big scale they are able to make a more positive contribution to the community and help on a better level improving the economy rather than weakening it. However as these non government organisations are usually smaller charity the question is brought about how they make there funding and get a team of people to usually go over and help in third world countries.
A lot of the time funding comes due to promoting the work and the help that they are giving to people who have it a lot worse then ourselves. Non government organisations aswell as government driven ones will often play on the fact that innocent people are dying, suffering and struggling to survive to make people feel guilty and then they will often contribute in forms of donations or actually volunteering their help. The part that is linking this area of foreign aid to my photographic personal investigation is the fact that photography and video are often used as promotional material to receive funds and volunteers. For government organisations they tend to have famous, world known professions photojournalists to capture images which are often propaganda material, i will return to this style of promotion in later posts where im interested in researching the truth behind documentary photography.
attached are a few examples of foreign aid websites which include a variety of promotional material. most through the use of potography:
Many of foreign aid organisations use forms of documentary photography to promote the areas which people who donate will be helping. The typical approaches used are to either show traumatic/ emotionally erousing images due to them portraying the true harshness of life or the aftermath of what the help is doing, for example happy smiling children because ‘you’ are helping them to have clean water and survive. Non Government organisations which don’t receive such great amounts of funding tend to use vernacular images to promote their organisation.
Vernacular photography are photographs which are usually taken by amateur photographers who when are attending these aid trips capture ordinary natural images of the communities everyday life. They focus on common things as subjects and is closely related to found photography. Non government organisations use this form of amateur photography to capture just whatever they are seeing at that present time and then when they return from the aid trip may look through images they gathered at the time and just put them into a website or leaflet to promote what they have been doing. Furthermore the point is that they have gone with no intention to take any photos and maybe this may mean that the photos are more realistic and therefore thruthful as they do not have the purpose of propaganda like professional phtoographers for government organisations may do.
When initially researching the background of the burkina faso freedom organisation i was looking through archival images of photographs which had been taken on previous trips and could notice that the only photographs that were being captured over there of the community and project where vernacular images, most often of the children smiling.
i started thinking about how is this the best way to promote this organisation. The images are plain ordinary images of children seeming happy and smiling. i dont think that they include the powerful message which they possible could. The images are showing the happy state that the community is in due to the project and the compassion project which we are linked to which offer huge amounts of help. However it seems as if they may not need anymore help. i think that they may recieve more funding from people wanting to help if the images where environmental portraits of the area focusing more on specific individuals with straights faces and m,aybe a background which creates a story which shows the individual struggles these family may be going through.
Vernacular images although provide truthful images of this happy community in the leaflet used to promote the Burkina trip, may not always be truthful and representative of the harshness of society over there. This leads me onto looking at the inside outside approach to photography. The approach is simple to understand as it basically means if you’re an inside photographer you are taking pictures of your local area and community and if you are an outside photographer you tend to be photographing in a different country and you are an outsider looking in to photograph these areas. It is known that inside and outside photographers will capture different images maybe portraying different messages. For example, the images taken above have been taken by previous team members, as they are from jersey and do not live in the local area they are capturing photographs of what they see and imagine life to be like out there again linking back to vernacular photography. whereas a photographer from/living in Burkina Faso may capture compleatly contradicting images because they experiences the community, culture and environment in a different way and there images often tell a different story.
Florent Mazzoleni
Florent Mazzoleni, is a local photographer in Burkina Faso, therefore taking the inside approach photographing an area he knows well. Although Mazzoleni focuses on a different type of photography i did find his story and photographs inspiring and they will have an impact on the style of portraits that i take when i go away to Africa. He focuses on documenting the cultural scene of reminiscent.
Florent Mazzoleni captured portrait images of young males and females in his home town, Bobo Dioulasso, one of the largest cities and cultural capital of Burkina Faso. The portrait images he captured where of ordinary people, sometimes family and friends and he used a 20 or 30 rolls of film to produce his staged portraiture. Although he has a different concept and focusing on capturing different cultural and social issues to what i am focusing on with my project about aid trips and the way they help. i still found it interesting to look at and analyse how an inside photographer of Burkina Faso captured images and the way he presented them. What i find most interesting about the portraits above is the amount of planning and sense of placement is involved in the images. the images have been structured and staged to look the way they do. This has the impact of focusing us on only what the subject looks like, what they are wearing and maybe the way they have positioned themselves. We try to create a story in our minds of who that individual is. Whereas so far images i have looked at include background making them environmental portraits as this tells the audience about who we are looking at.
Mazzoleni’s photography has inspired me to consider a different approach whilst i am over there, and i am now considering focusing a shoot around the individuals of the community capturing photographs of them against a plain background, holding a straight face as i feel this makes a successful portrait. i then have the idea to add text to the image. I want to speak to the members of the community i am photographing and find out o=about there life their aspirations, the struggles they may be experiencing in everyday life, as this will add a deep meaning and context to my images.
Furthermore from this research on a photographer from Burkina Faso, the area i am visiting on my aid trip i have started to be influenced on the types of images that i want to capture out there and the deeper meaning of getting pictures with text maybe linking to how they feel the work that we are doing in the community is either benefiting them or harming there community.
A huge conspiracy which has surrounded the thinking and research of many economic specialists is whether foreign aid is actually helping third world countries is mass poverty or whether is it just trying to modernise them to quickly and the fact that government organisations may actually be harming rather than helping. I feltlike this linked into my personal investigation because i am going on a small non government organised trip and i will be able to see the impact that the work that is being done through this charitable work is making slow progress to the community and reducing illiterate rates and decreasing poverty. However it has been argued by the newest winner of the nobel prize in economics that big foreign aid organisations may be having the reverse effects to what small selfless charities are doing. Angus Denton is an economist at Princeton university and has studied poverty in both Indian and south america. His ideas about foreign aid are particularly provocative as he argues that “by trying to help poor people in developing countries, the rich world may actually be corrupting those nations’ governments and slowing their growth.”
It is understandable that this view has caused mass debate and a lot of upst due to the amount people give to charity and yes it can be argued truthfully that aid organisations have a massively positive impact on the poverty and disease which is causing monstrous death rates in third world countries and have decreased the amount of poverty and death rates due to starvation has decreased aver the last couple of decades. This has been through organisations set up and run by the government installing fresh water, providing vaccinations and in some areas a place to live. However i am interested in Deatons argument as it is a revisionist view and has become increasingly studied. Although he wasnt the first to economist to challenge assumptions that foreign aid helped, over the past two decades his arguments began to receive great amounts of attention because he was finding secure evidence for his reasoning. Deaton’s skepticism about the benefits of foreign aid grew out of his research, which involved looking in detail at households in the developing world, where he could see the effects of foreign aid intervention.
Federal Nigerian troops walk along a road to the frontier with Biafray, Oct. 13, 1968. On the roadside two emaciated Nigerian boys suffer from starvation and malnutrition. (AP Photo/Dennis Lee Royle)
The first lot of evidence for his and others research was the fact that altho the level of foreign aid in africa soared in the 80’s and 90’s the african economies were actually doing worse which isnt what youd expect to see. Economic growth has not been being produced through these aid organisations. A correlation has been made between the increasing rate of foreign aid coming into a country with a lower economic growth. therefore this leads to the question of why this is occurring ad why aid organisation may lead to negative impacts to countries instead of what they are intended to do which is help. Researchers came to a conclusion of why this reverse effect may be occurring; so the idea is that in order to have the funding to run a country, this specific country needs to be collecting taxes from its population. As the people hold the ropes they in some sense have a certain amount of control over the government through the way that if the government dont provide people with the certain services they promise then the people can cut them off/ not give taxes. Deatons main arguement against foreign aid is that it weakens this relationship betweeen the people and government.
Therefore the genral idea is that if the people are getting the services they require, such as food, clear water, medication, health care and housing from foreign aid they arent going to be paying taxation to the government who weren’t able to provide them with these services. this weakens the relationship and furthermore the economy, leaving these third world countries in a worsened economic state than they originally were. Moreover other arguements have began to appear about the fact that big foreign aid organisations are also modernising third world countries to the point that when the aid leaves them the countries cannot keep up with the moderness as they dont have the resources or funding and are not accomodated to this new modern way of life. This can be seen as distrupting local communities way of life. For example, a foreign aid organisation may visit and poverty stricken area in Africa, provide the children with vaccinations and medication, but what happens when these run out, they don’t have the resources, knowledge or technology to remake medication. Therefore although it is seeming that in promotional adverts these organisations are helping they are giving them the final outcome rather than building communities up to be able to cater for themselves and be independent without further requiring on these charities.
This leads me onto the difference between government organisations and non government organisations. I believe that the area which i am going to, Bobo, has been transformed in a positive way which hasn’t worsened the economy. The money that is raised goes towards the compassion project which educates the communities children and provides them with cooking skills and basic health and hygiene lessons which allows them to reduce the chances of disease. The Burkina Faso freedom project which i am taking part in also aims at building up the community at a low level with basic classrooms, medical centers and toilet blocks which aim to improve their way of life in a slow manor which they can kept up with and will continue to grow at a rate which is right for them.
