Week 2- Aperture Practitioners.

Sally Mann

Sally Mann is a well known American photographer. She started photographing at a young age and once she got a family of her own she photographed them. One of her most famous photo series is 'Immediate family' where she photographed her children, this photo series caused a lot of controversy because of the nudity and minor injuries were involved but Sally says she finds the photographs “natural through the eyes of a mother, since she has seen her children in every state: happy, sad, playful, sick, bloodied, angry and even naked.” She said the raw photographs of her nude and hurt children reflect truth of nature and human kind, but many people disagreed. Sally see's things in a different way, she likes to shock and horrify her viewers to make them think about the unthinkable which I think it is safe to say she did. In 2001 Times magazine named Sally the 'Best photographer of the year" I believe this award encouraged sally to veer away from controversial work and push her towards photographing simple landscapes but this didn't last long, Sally was to much of a risk taker to play it safe with Landscapes she states herself she likes to photograph the rare and obscene, Sally decided to stick to what she knew and loved but this time push the limits even more by photographing decaying bodies and her dead Greyhound Ava, this photo series was called 'What remains'. Over all I love Sally's work because of the shock factor, it keeps me interested even if some of it does make me feel ill thats not the point, it makes me wonder what happened to those people, what is going on in that child's mind and what triggered someone to find beauty in death. 

Untitled- Sally Mann

                                                                                    

This photograph is stunning, the way sally has captured the light beaming down through the clouds and blanketing the hills in the background is captivating. For Sally to capture this she would have had to have used a high F stop for a wide depth of field. If she had used a low F stop i don't think this photo would have been as successful because it would have taken the attention away from the beams of light and focused more on the paddock and trees in front of her.

Virginia at Four- Sally Mann

This here is a photograph of one of Sally's daughters. Most people would probably look at this and think of the worst but for me I can't help but think that Sally has captured her daughters innocence beautifully. Being naked, especially for a child isn't all that bad, infact they seem to enjoy it. I love how Sally has made the child at the front in focus and the one behind out of focus, I feel if they were both in focus the white dress that the little girl in the background is wearing would have been to bright and distracting whereas now it is toned down and we are focused more on the expressions on Virginias face.

LEWIS HINE

Lewis Hine is an American photographer and Sociologist, Wikipedia states that his photographs played a part in the changes of child labour laws. In 1998 Lewis became the photographer for national child labour committee (NCLC) capturing shocking photographs of young children being over worked in factories. This wasn't easy for Lewis, in fact it was rather dangerous as he was quite often threatened by factory police and foreman because Child Labour was not supposed to be known about. Lewis talked to one girl that said she had been working in the cotton mill for 1 year, sometimes she worked at night, this young girl ran 4 sides and only got 48cents a day. Lewis asked the young girl how old she was but she hesitated and said she didn't remember "Im not old enough to work, but do just the same". In 1930 Lewis was asked to document the construction of the Empire state building. Lewis photographed the workers in gut wrenching positions as they secure the structure. Apparently Lewis had a special made iron cage that he sat in trying to get the perfect vantage points to photograph the workers as they sat and ate lunch and built the structure.

Lunch atop a skyscraper- Lewis Hine

This is an image Lewis took of the workers having their lunch break 256 meters above new york city, this photograph makes me feel very nervous as I am afraid of heights just the mere thought of my feet dangling off the edge like those workers gives me chills. Even though this photograph is very daunting i must admit that it is very spectacular and has given me a pretty good idea of how high up the workers were. He has used a narrow depth of field so that the workers are the main focus and the buildings below are tiny. The narrow focus has given this photo a more of an extreme perspective. 

'The overseer said apologetically, "She just happened in." She was working steadily. The mills seem full of youngsters who "just happened in" or "are helping sister." Newberry, South Carolina. ' This is an original caption from one of  Lewis Hine's photographs of children in the mills. This photograph makes me feel sadness. How could someone so young and innocent be forced to work in such an unsafe environment. At that age she should be at home playing with her dolls but instead she made to do hard labour. She would have grown up to think that working is all there is to life but in reality there is so much more to life than that. She had to grow up to fast.