Documentary Expression & Popular Photography

The Great Depression in the United States• Longest and worst economic collapse in the history of the

modern industrial world.• Lasted from the end of 1929 until early 40s.• There was a decline in the production and sale of goods, and a

severe rise in unemployment.• Businesses - banks - closed. People lost jobs, homes, savings.• Many people depended on charity to survive.• Many Americans spent more than they earned, farmers had to

deal with heavy debt and lower prices for their goods.• The effects of World War 1 (1914-1918) caused economic

problems in many countries. Europe was struggling to pay war debts.

• These problems-and the resulting weak economy-contributed to the major crisis that started the Great Depression - the U.S. stock market crash of 1929, which financially ruined thousands of investors.

Dorothea Lange, Line Up at Social Security, 1930s

In 1935, the US government turned to various agencies for help in fighting the Depression. In 1937, the Resettlement

Aministration became part of the Dept. of Agriculture under the title of Farm Security Administration (FSA).

Right: Chief of Historical Section of FSA, Roy Stryker

The goal was to show America a desperate situation and togain support for President Roosevelt’s new programs:grants, loans and resettlement money to displaced farmers.

“Was it journalism? Yes and No. Was it history? Of course.Was it education? Very much so. If I had to sum it up, I’dsay…we (the FSA photographic corps) succeeded in doing exactlywhat…we should do: we introduced Americans to America.”-- Roy Stryker

Lange, Migrant Farm Worker, 1939

Arthur Rothstein, Dust Storm, Cimarron County, OK, 1936

Rothstein, Steer Skull, 1936

Rothstein, Field Workers, 1936

Walker Evans, Houses and Billboards, Alanta, Georgia, 1936

Walker Evans, Roadside Store, LA, 1936

Evans, Bud Fields and Family, 1936

Evans, Tenant Farmer Bed, 1936

Evans, American Photographs, 1938

Evans, Roadside Restaurant, 1936

Evans, Sign, Torn Movie Poster, 1936

Evans, Negro Barber Shop, Atlanta, 1936 1936

Evans, 1936

Evans was concerned that his photographs not beconsidered ‘propaganda’ or ‘political.’ When he accepted the FSA assignment, he wrote a note to himself which read “..Never make photographic statements for the government. This is pure record, not propaganda.”

“I do have a critical mind, but I am not a social protestartist, although I have been taken as one very widely. You’re not, and shouldn’t be, I think, trying to change the world, saying ‘Open up your heart and b;leed for these people.’ I would never dream of saying anything like that. I believe in staying out of the way.” -- Evans speaking to an audience of Harvard students.

Dorothea Lange, 1934

Lange, Migrant Mother, 1936

Lange, Migrant Mother alternate view, 1936

Lange, Migrant Mother alternate view, 1936

Dorothea Lange, Ex-Slave, Alabama, 1937

Lange, Cotton Picker, Near Eutaw, Alabama 1937

Lange, One Nation Indivisible, 1942

Lange, Pacific Railroad,1937

Lange, 1937

Dorothea Lange at work, 1940s

Ben Shahn, Cotton Pickers, Pulaski County, Arkansas, 1935

Shahn, Unemployed Miner, Arkansas, 1935

Russell Lee, Child of Migrant Worker in Car, 1939

Gordon Parks, Ella Watson, American Gothic, 1942

Grant Wood, American Gothic, 1930

Parks, Newsboy, Harlem, 1930s

Parks, Fashion for LIFE, 1949

Parks, Muhammad Ali, 1970

Parks’ photo essays highlighting African Americanissues and leaders from a cross-section of the community, such as Martin Luther King, Eldridge Cleaverand Muhammad Ali, reached a broad audience(via LIFE magazine).

Parks, Shaft, 1971

Parks, Shaft, 1971 (introduced into the Library of Congress in 2000) , Shaft 2000

As WW2 approached, there was a trend of optimism - people wanted to put troubling news aside. This attitude would take hold in the late 1930s - early 1940s. The images done by the FSA were opposite of this optimistic view.

“Teach the underprivileged to have fewer children and lessmisery,” “Touched me to the point were I would like to quiteverything in order to help these stricken people,” “A falseimpression is given of American farm conditions. Typical ofthe New Deal bunk at taxpayer’s expense.” “Everycomfortable person who objects to the present Administration’sefforts to help the poor should be made to look at these splendidpictures until they see daylight.” -- written responses to a NewYork exhibition of FSA photographs in 1938.

George Hurrell, Jean Harlow, 1935

Anatol Josepho, Photo Booth, 1930s

Capra, It’s a Wonderful Life, 1946 - WW2 ended in 1945

Margaret Bourke-White, first cover of LIFE magazine, 1936

“To see life; to see the world; to eyewitness great events, to watch the face of the poor and the

gestures of the proud; to see strange things; to see and take pleasure in seeing; to see and be

amazed; to see and be instructed.”

Margaret Bourke-White, first cover of LIFE magazine, 1936

“To see life; the see the world; to eyewitness great events; to

watch the face of the poor and the gestures of the proud; to

see strange things; to see and take pleasure in seeing; to

see and be amazed; to see and be instructed.”

- LIFE magazine, November 1936

Margaret Bourke-White,from Life photo essay, 1936

Margaret Bourke-White, Life photo essay, 1936

Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971)

Bourke-White, Concentration Camp Survivors, 1945

Bourke-White, After the Louisville Flood, 1930s

August Sander, Master Upholsterer, Berlin, 1929

“Simple, natural portraits that show the subject in an environment corresponding to their own individuality.”

Sander, Varnisher, 1930

Sander, Bricklayer, 1928

Sander, Pastry Cook, 1928

Sander, Boxers, Cologne 1929

• In 1929, the first of a proposed series of 20 volumes of Sander’s photographs was published under the title “Face of Our Time.”

• The Nazis banned the book in 1934, destroyed the printing press, confiscated the books and negatives.

• They believed the photographs revealed a diversity of physical characteristics that were contrary to Nazi teachings about class and race. Sander, Boxers, Cologne 1929

Berndt & Hilla Becher, Water Towers

Andreas Gursky, 99 Cents Market

Bill Brandt, Parlormaids Ready to Serve Dinner, Parlormaid Preparing a Bath Before Dinner, 1932-35

Brandt, Worker Family at Table, County Durham, 1932-35

Brandt, 1932-35

“The extreme social contrast, during those years before the war,was visually, very inspiring for me.”

Brandt, Snicket in Halifax, 1937

Brandt, Policeman in a Dockland Alley, Bermondsey, 1938

James Van Der Zee, Couple in Raccoon Coats, 1932

Harold Edgerton, Drop of Milk, 1930

Portrait of Robert Capa (Andre Friedmann 1913-1954)

Capa, Death of a Loyalist soldier, 1936

Joe Rosenthal, Marines Raising Flag on Iwo Jima, 1945

Capa, Street Fighting 1936, Amist Rubble After Air Raid, 1937

Capa: “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you aren’t close enough.”

Capa, D-Day, Normandy, June 6, 1944

William Eugene Smith, U.S. Marines With Wounded, Dying Infant, 1944

Smith,cover of LIFE magazine,1945

World War II- a few facts

• Global war - lasted from 1939-1945 (some conflicts in Asia started earlier).

• Involved the vast majority of the world’s nations.• The most widespread war in history - involved more than 100 million

people from more than 30 countries.• “Total war” - all economic, industrial and scientific capabilities were

utilized for the “war effort.”• Massive deaths of civilians: including the Holocaust, massive use of

airpower to bomb enemy cities, and first use of nuclear weapons (Hiroshima, Nagasaki).

• Reulted in 50-85 million fatalities. • Deadliest conflict in human history• W. Eugene Smith, Battle of Saipan Island, U,.S. Marines in combat with

Japanese.

Roman Vishniac, Boy With Earlocks, 1937

John Heartfield, Through Light to Night, 1933

Henri Cartier Bresson, Gestapo Informant, Dessau,Germany 1945

Edward Steichen, Herbert Bayer, Road to Victory exhibition, MoMA New York, 1942

Edward Steichen, Herbert Bayer, Road to Victory exhibition, MoMA New York, 1942

Lee Miller, Buchenwald, April 1945

Lee Miller, “I implore you to believe this is true.”

Chapter 9: Retake

• With the Great Depression came an age of documentary practice in American film and photography.

• Central to photojournalism: images of the poor and efforts to help them.

• The FSA’s straightfoward style became popular in newspapers and magazines as did the photo essay (several images dedicated to a single theme).

• Photography’s capability for entertainment (photo booths, celebrity images) grew.

• During WWII, newspapers and picture magazines (LIFE) were ready to report, protest and propagandize.

• The eye witness documentary style became strongly associated with the Great Depression and the war years.