Newspaper Page Text
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Focusing on the
human condition
L J Katharine Bird
NC News Service
"You put your camera around
your neck in the morning along
with putting on your shoes, and
there it is, an appendage of the
body that shares your life with
you."
That’s how photographer
Qorothea Lange spoke about her
tu.nera in the book "Dorothea
Lange: Photographs of a Lifetime"
(Aperture Inc.).
Ms. Lange, who died in 1965, is
renowned for her expressive
photographic portraits. While
working for the U S. Farm Securi
ty Administration for five years,
she traveled extensively compiling
a record of the Great Depression
i he United States.
One of her most famous
photographs is "White Angel
Bread Line,” taken in San Fran
cisco in 1932.
Here she zeroes in on an old
man leaning on a fence with
clasped hands and compressed
lips, his back turned on his com
panions. His shoulders are hunch-
t ’over, his crumpled hat pulled
low over his forehead.
More than five decades later
that photograph still conveys the
despair the man felt. It compels
viewers to draw into focus the
misery caused by joblessness and
poverty.
That may well be just what the
us faced
"The heavens declare the glory
of God, and the firmament pro
claims his handiwork" (Psalm 19).
But having made men and
women in his own image and
likeness, they especially reflect his
creative love. To the ex
tent that they do this, they are
signs of God’s presence and love.
—Thus, every time a fellow
human being is encountered, God
also is encountered.
—And one’s response to a
human being becomes a response
God.
Jesus of Nazareth, the perfect
image of the Father, put this quite
simply: "I assure you, as often as
you did it for one of my least
brothers (or sisters) you did it for
me" (Matthew 25:40).
(Father Castelot teaches at St.
John's Seminary, Plymouth,
Mich.)
V
photographer intended. Explaining
the philosophy that guided her
work, Ms. Lange said once: “The
camera is an instrument that
teaches people how to see
without a camera."
A photograph has the
remarkable ability to help people
see what’s going on in their world
more clearly and sharply. By
focusing in on a person’s anguish
or sorrow or joy, a photograph
brings an event to life for viewers.
A photograph can do that, ex
plained Father Ernan McMullin,
because it "freezes a moment in
time." A photo makes an event
"concrete and brings it home im
mediately in a way that words in
a book don’t," he added. An avid
photographer since childhood,
Father McMullin is former chair
man of the philosophy department
at the University of Notre Dame.
On occasion, an especially mov
ing photograph can touch a chord
of compassion in people and lead
them to take action that responds
to the situation the camera has
captured.
Robert Coles, in an introductory
essay in Ms. Lange’s book, said:
Her Depression-era "photographs
marshaled public sympathy for a
necessary relief program...and per
suaded a reluctant Congressional
committee to vote funds for that
program by focusing in on the
misery and hopelessness caused by
the Depression."
For Coles, artists such as Ms.
Lange "produce texts or pictures
that pulse with moral passion,
awakening our own connection to
the individuals who are their sub
jects."
Another photographer with that
ability was Margaret Bourke-
White,- a renowned Life magazine
news-photographer in the 1920s
and 1930s. She is a favorite of
Father McMullin.
Assigned to cover developments
in India, Ms. Bourke-White "fre
quently caught scenes of human
suffering in Calcutta’s slums with
poignancy," the philosopher said.
Photos introduce us to condi
tions of life and ways of living
that differ sharply from what most
of us are used to, Father McMullin
said.
Great photographers, he con
cluded, have the unique ability to
allow us to grasp the possibilities
for the human family "in ways we
ordinarily would not by providing
access to a world" beyond our
own.
(Ms. Bird is associate editor of
Faith Today.)
FOOD..
Faith Today • Page 3
Down marbled corridors deep
within a magnificent columned
structure in Washington, D C.,
paintings of the men and women
who make up the American
drama are on display. Here, in
the Smithsonian’s National Por
trait Gallery, are images of
American Indians and western
explorers, philosophers and
schemers, heroes and villains.
A special gallery in the
museum contains a number of
photographs taken by Mathew
Brady, the great 19th-century
chronicler of American leader
ship. The dominant public
figures of the 1860s are here: Jef
ferson Davis, president of the
Confederate States; Union
Generals Ulysses Grant, William
Sherman and Philip Sheridan;
Henry Ward Beecher, Protestant
clergyman and writer; and Car
dinal John McCloskey, the first
American cardinal.
And there are the haunting im
ages of Abraham Lincoln, with
eyes sunken, face wrinkled and
the sad expression of a man wat
ching his children engage in a
savage struggle.
People seem to be drawn to
the Brady photographs. But
why? What value is there in stu
dying the stern expressions of
men and women in stiff poses
and peculiar dress? What
relevance does it have?
These same questions were
asked in Brady’s time. One
answer was offered in the Oct.
6, I860, edition of the New
York Times.
...for discussion
1. When you take your camera
to a family gathering or on a
trip, what is it that you are try
ing to capture on film? Why is it
important to you?
2. Think of a photograph that
you would hate to lose. Why do
you value it so highly? What
does it say to you?
3. A photograph is just one
way of focusing on and, in a
sense, contemplating the people
and the world around us. But
why would the people of the
church want to contemplate the
people and the world around
them? What do they see there?
What do they seek there?
...for thought
This is the last
known photograph
of Abraham Lin
coln. It was taken
April 10, 1865,
four days before
the president's
assassination. The
photographer was
Alexander Gardner,
an assistant to
Mathew Brady.
Brady’s photographs, the
newspaper said, are “the means
which we shall bequeath to our
posterity of knowing what man
ner of men and women we
Americans of I860 were. All our
books, all our newspapers, all
our private letters...will not so
betray us to our coming critics as
the millions of photographs we
shall leave behind us.
"Our children’s children may
look into our very eyes and
judge us as we are. Perhaps this
will be no great advantage to us,
but, in our children’s children’s
name, we ought to thank Mr.
Brady and those who labor with
him to this end," the newspaper
said.
What manner of men and
women are we today? Wiser
than our forebears? More
tolerant? What will our
children’s children, flipping
through a worn and faded photo
album, discover in our eyes?
SECOND HELPINGS
“A Way in the World: Family
Life as Spiritual Discipline,’’ by
Ernest Boyer Jr. "The great
gift” of family spirituality is that
family members can find God in
the routine activities of daily
life, writes Boyer. In family life
and especially in parenting,
people have a "direct participa
tion in the cycles of eternity
and the opportunity to see
within the processes of in
dividual love the working of a
greater love,” he says. Boyer
tells how his great-grandfather
“spoke of God as of someone
present right there in the room,
listening and responding to all
that was said and yet somehow
also touching all the rest of the
universe.” (Harper and Row,
10 E. 53rd St., New York, N Y.
10022. $12.95.)