Street Portrait

• Liam2673

  Participant

  June 10, 2009 at 10:05 am

  I was reading about Dorothea Lange and her ‘Migrant Mother’ image….

  Dorothea Lange’s take on the photo is as follows:

  “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 thirty-two. 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. “

  Years later, the mother was tracked down, and her views were:

  “I wish she [Lange] hadn’t taken my picture. I can’t get a penny out of it. She didn’t ask my name. She said she wouldn’t sell the pictures. She said she’d send me a copy. She never did.” Her son said that the family felt shamed by the way it showed them.

  The interesting thing for me here is that
  Lange justified it in her own mind…..the mother “seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There was a sort of equality about it. ” when in fact there was clearly no equality about it, Lange should have known the mother would never get anything out of it. The purpose was to take a good photo, not to help the mother.

  So my point here..as an extrapolation from this…is street photography a rip off….is it simply wrong to photograph people without their agreement or approval, and without explaining why you are taking the photo?