Ways of Reading

Kimberly Ayres
Position Statement
Make a Move
If I have ever witnessed passion and purpose in my life, it would be that of Dorothea Lange, one of the most renown photographers of the Great Depression era. She was finishing up a photographing trip of migratory farm labor for the Resettlement Administration (part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal attempt that provided federal government aid to resettle farmers deeply affected by the Great Depression to new land according to Ohio Historical Society website) when she took some of her most famous photographs including “Migrant Mother� that sent her career soaring (Women Come to the Front). Just like James Agee and Walker Evans, she experienced the poverty and neglect of the farmers in our country during the Great Depression. Her fervor of her experience is spoken throughout her pictures.
In the short clip of A Visual Life, Dorothea Lange speaks about her relation to a camera by referring to it as “an appendage.� She is so utterly devoted to her work that she considers the apparatus a physical attachment that can function as productive as any other limb on her body. In A Visual Life she also states, when referring to what is projected through a lens, that “this is the way it is. Look at it.� My inference from that statement was that the idea of taking a picture of a scene emphasizes the audience to actually take in what is given in the printed image. A photograph underlines the image or the event that is taken out of reality so that we, as viewers, are forced to interpret the purpose or indication of it. Lange wants us to evaluate the image that she, or any other photographer, presents to their spectators. For example, if you see a picture of children playing in a rundown and polluted environment, Lange would want you to conjure up the intensity of the issue of poverty in the lives of innocent children. With this advice from Lange, I am able to deeply analyze not only what is shown in the picture, but also what is represented through the lens of any specific occurrence. In A Visual Life, Lange also speaks about her photograph’s impact on the viewers:
“No one asks how did you do it, where did you find it, they would say that such things could be.� With that statement, I realize that Lange is describing how a superior photograph should capture an idea or express an event. From what the image entails, the viewers should gain a feeling of belief and truth. To truly understand a photographer’s intention, I believe that one should have significant proof in their mind of that occurrence from each detail and figure that the suitable photographer has captured in a picture. Even if the photograph is cropped or untrue, the photographer’s intended message should be evident for the viewer.
Later in Lange’s life, when she worked for the government to photograph Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbor in armed camps, many of her pictures were censored (Women Come to the Front). Her idea of truth in her photographs was hindered by the government when she tried to expose the harshness and tragedy in these camps. Her devotion would have exposed too much reality to the public. Lange’s photographs would be analyzed for validity just as James Agee’s writing, or Walker Evans’ photographs.
It is apparent that in both Lange’s photographs and Agee’s literature that people with such passion and fervor for their work still receive critical reviews. Both people used their works to spark a movement or expose an occurrence to the public. Lange did so by capturing the conditions of poor farmer families in California with her photographs. Agee attempted to inform the public of the poverty of farmers in Hale Country, Alabama with his text. What I see in both of these artists is each of their extreme respect and passion for their works and experiences. The extreme devotion of Dorothea Lange has influenced me to go beyond the norm to activate people’s interests, to promote my ideals, and to interpret resources with all facts and figures considered. To make a movement, one needs to depict the facts in a manner, as Lange describes in A Visual Life as previously mentioned, that people simply believe “that such things could be.�

Works Cited
Fleischhauer, Carl and Beverly Brannan. Documenting America: Photographic Series. 1988. 17 September 2007 .
Women Come to the Front: Journalists, Photographers, and Broadcasters During World War II. 19 June 2006. 17 September 2007 .
Resettlement Administration, Ohio History Central, September 20 2007,