Field of View: The Politic Aesthetic

 Via Field of View

September 28, 2024

Excerpted from "The Politic Aesthetic   Access is gone. Moments are dead. Long live the flash"

(see also the virtual exhibition "The Campaign"

"Few photos exemplify access like this gem by LIFE magazine photographer Hank Walker: Kennedy and his brother Robert deep in conversation in a hotel room during that same convention in 1960. It’s one of my all-time favorite political photographs. Access to an authentic moment like this is a photojournalist’s dream.

    photograph by Hank Walker

“The brothers talked very quietly, and Jack told Bobby who he was going to choose as Vice President,” Walker said in a 1994 interview. “I only made one picture in there, and then I waited outside for Bobby to come out. When he did, he was furious.”2

Walker’s contact sheet proves he made way more than just one picture—he wasn’t escorted in and hurried out in 30 seconds. Walker was allowed to work it. Notice how at first he’s shooting horizontally (frame 23), then rotates his camera and makes the one (frame 24).

Photographs by Hank Walker

Henri Cartier-Bresson once said that using a flash was “monstrous” and “impolite, like coming to a concert with a pistol in your hand.” Some of the photos from the 2024 conventions were definitely monstrous.

Photograph by Mark Peterson

Mark Peterson has been temporarily blinding politicians with his strobe for years. “The flash is like crack to them,” he once said.

Photograph by Mark Peterson

A regular contributor to The New York Times Opinion section (mostly b&w) and New York magazine (mostly color), Peterson’s flash does more than light the scene—it defines it. It’s his signature look, one he’s refined and mastered. And it’s contagious."  full article here.

Stanley Forman talks about bearing witness to the news, being the first on the scene, and the importance of photography

Credit Stanley Forman

The flag turns into a weapon in fight outside City Hall during the busing riots in 1976. Forman won a Pulitzer Prize for for this photograph

Via WGBH

Photojournalist Stanley Forman has been at the scene of most of Boston’s news events for the past 40 years, capturing iconic images that define the people and places in those stories. His work has earned him three Pulitzer Prizes, and he’s now working on a book entitled “Before Yellow Tape: A Pulitzer Prize Winner’s Fire Images.”

Forman sat down with Emily Rooney to talk about bearing witness to the news, being the first on the scene, and the importance of photography.



On becoming a photojournalist…

As a kid, I [followed] the sirens, the blue lights, the red lights. And finally, when I was around eighteen, my father said, “You go to all these things — why don’t you take a camera?” I thought I was going to be a firefighter. But he gave me a camera, and I got interested in photography, and I was very lucky.

On covering fires today…

You don’t have the access. I get to a fire, forget yellow tape — no matter what it is — you just don’t have the access that we had in the ‘60s, the ‘70s, the ‘80s. Everything has changed. I blame [changes in access] on O.J. Simpson, because everything changed after the mistakes they made at the scene.

On technology turning everyone into a photographer…

I’m self publishing — I know nothing about publishing … Anything you want to do in this digital age, you can become it. Do I like everyone taking pictures? I’m beat before I get there. No, I don’t like it … I’d like to think my framing is better than the guy with the iPhone, or the woman with the iPhone, but they have the image. Everything gets used.

On moving from the Boston Herald to Channel 5 in the ‘80s…

You cover news … with a still camera or a video camera. You use a Phillips screwdriver or a standard screwdriver. I’m still covering news, and that’s the most important thing to me.

Credit Stanley Forman

Fireman rescue Tammi Brownlee from a burning building in South Boston, 1977

 

 

 

 

Credit Stanley Forman

Evacuating horses from a burning stable at Suffolk Downs

 

 

Slideshow here

 

 

LA Times, Washington Post Photographers Win Pulitzers for Photos

Via PDNPULSE
April 18, 2011


Barbara Davidson of the Los Angeles Times has been awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in Feature Photography for her story on innocent victims of gang violence. Carol Guzy, Nikki Kahn and Ricky Carioti of the Washington Post were awarded the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News Photography for their images of the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti. The Pulitzers were announced today at Columbia University in New York.

Both prizes come with a $10,000 award; the Washington Post photographers will share their $10,000 prize.

Finalists were also announced today. In the Feature Photography category, Todd Heisler of The New York Times was cited for his photo essay on a Colombia family carrying a genetic mutation that causes early Alzheimer’s; Greg Kahn of The Naples Daily was cited for his study of how the recession in Florida has meant loss of jobs and homes for some, and profits for others.

In the Breaking News category, Getty Images photographers Daniel Berehulak and Paula Bronstein were cited for their images of people surviving the floods in Pakistan. Carolyn Cole of the Los Angeles Times was named a finalist for her images of the oil spill off the Gulf of Mexico and her documentation of its widespread devastation.

The jury for the Pulitzer’s photography prizes was chaired by Nancy Andrews, managing editor/digital media, Detroit Free Press. The other jurors were Francisco Bernasconi, senior director of photography, Getty Images; Colin Crawford, deputy managing editor, photography, Los Angeles Times; Richard Murphy, photo director, Anchorage Daily News; and Steve Gonzales, director of photography, Houston Chronicle.

The full list of 2011 Pulitzers can be found at http://www.pulitzer.org/. Davidson’s gang story can be found on the Los Angeles Times web site. Images from “Haiti Profound Sorrow” can be viewed on the Washington Post web site.