Re: A simple question...

"Neil Harrington" <not@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
"Floyd L. Davidson" <floyd@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:8763qthmzq.fld@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Neil Harrington" <not@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
"Victor" <Victor@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Plus the fact surely, that had Lange wanted the subject's face in focus
as well, it would only have been necessary for her to adjust the pose
imperceptably - by the subject leaning back slighly into a less hunched
position, so as to bring her face and hand in line with her elbow.

As far as I know Lange was not directing the subject at all, the shot was
not posed and so there was no pose to adjust.

The picture was posed, in the sense that Lange very
clearly influenced the subjects, discussed the pictures
with them, and only made exposures when the subjects
were arranged in the way she desired. Only the first
two images (of the entire tent) were taken without
conversation with the mother about the pictures.

The point is that these are not candid images in any way
shape or form.

As I recall from Lange's own

You seem to have very selective memory.

Oh, really?


comments on the photo, she just moved in closer taking a short series of
pictures, the woman more or less got used to her doing that and paid
little
attention to her, while the children were bashful as the picture shows.

These are Lange's own comments about the event, in a 1960 interview:

"I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother, as if drawn by a
magnet. I do not remember how I explained my presence or my camera to her
but I do remember she asked me no questions. I made five exposures, working
closer and closer from the same direction. I did not ask her name or her
history. She told me her age, that she was 32. She said that they had been
living on frozen vegetables from the surrounding fields, and birds that the
children killed. She had just sold the tires from her car to buy food. There
she sat in that lean-to tent with her children huddled around her, and
seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There
was a sort of equality about it. "
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/migrantmother.htm

I believe that much more closely comports with my description of what she
did, than with yours. There is no mention of posing the shot -- "and so she
helped me" might mean that, or it might mean anything.

Neil, you are unable to understand an awful lot. That
is a description, given 25 years after the fact, of the
*highlights*. She discussed food, how they were living,
etc. etc. It is also know that the description is
factually in error (the drove off in the car that
supposedly had the wheels sold out from under it).

That description clearly does NOT match your concept of
how the images were made. Likewise if you look at the
sequence of images it is very clear that things were
being "adjusted" between images.

But say just for the sake of argument that Lange did pose the shot. If
anything that supports my contention that it's the mother's face that's the
subject and not the children. Why else would Lange arrange them in that way?
Why show only the backs of their heads?

Because she had one Hell of a sense of art when it comes
to photography! (Which is something that you do not
have, and have even denied the existence of.)

The one really memorable part of the photo is the mother's face. Show just
that part, isolated, to anyone who's seen the whole picture, even if they

If that were actually the case, they would have chosen
between two of the other images. Just look at the three
that preceded that one! (Note also that the one where
the child has a hand on the pole is supposed to have
been taken before the one where the child does not, yet
the first one is actually closer in than the second.)

saw it 30 or 40 years ago (which is probably the last time I saw the
full-page reproduction) and they will instantly remember where it came from
and remember the whole picture too. No other part of the photo is nearly
that memorable or recognizable.

So. You clearly are never going to equal or even come
close to Dorothea Lange when it comes to understanding
the art of photography. She nailed it. Here you are
decades later claiming that her subtle but very distinct
methodology somehow doesn't make that image what it very
clearly is to everyone else.

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@xxxxxxxxxx
.

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