Photographers and pain�.

I wonder whether this can be an interesting topic here. It is certainly

interesting for me. What do I mean? - photography (photographers) depicting

or expressing their own pain or other people's pain or some universal pain

maybe.. if there is such..

 

Reference-wise, I can point to MOVIES that are about people in pain � since

this is basically an American forum, Magnolia and The Hours come to mind,

that's from recent movies. Some of Bergman's films of course..

 

So, are there photographers that, in your opinion, can be discussed in this

respect?

.

 

Pain is in the eye of the beholder, eh what?

 

Of course I'm living and photographing my own suffering, one way or another. I can look at my photos whrough many "filters" and pain/suffering is one.

 

Everyone's life probably has their own personal, unique pain/suffering, yet once honired and faced and shared, we probably also see that it is universal and identical in some way to everyon elses.

 

Oh, I'm so morose in response to this post - lighten up, Peter Blaise!

 

Click!

 

Love and hugs,

 

Peter Blaise peterblaise@yahoo.com Photography is Free Speech http://www.peterblaisephotogrpahy.com/

 

PS - Of course there are those times when photography IS pain, like when something goes wrong, when the camera is not ready, or when I miss a shot ... ARGH! THAT is suffering! =8^o<div></div>

Sergei: my wife has Alzheimer's, and I am her primary care give--so I can tell you about pain. I have taken a number of photos of my wife (most always black and white), some reflecting her gloom, some reflecting her remaining beauty. For me, it is a therapy--to become even more intimate with her as I peer through that tiny viewfinder, seeing more of her in composition than in sitting across from her at the dinner table. I am pleased with my photos of her, though I don't display them--not because I'm am ashamed of her condition (or my mediocre photography), but because I can't imagine an audience for them. But, if Bergman's films can show pain or pathos, I suppose at some point I would do likewise. And I am so pleased you brought up this topic--it gave me a chance to reflect.

Vincent , I am sorry to hear what you are going though. The fact that you can still see the beauty in your wife, whether in a Photograph or real life , says as much about you, as it does about your wife. I am sure you will treasure in the future the photos you are taking now as much as the photos of her before this insidious disease over took her. Whether it comes in a instant or over many years, loosing a love one is never easy.If its photos or movies in the origional question , then I think Russian movies, and the Russian People in General, show and express pain much more than American's do.Stalin might have had something to do with that.

Vincent

 

What you wrote is a beautiful tribute to your wife. I can only imagine that your photos are a thousand times more complimentary. Having lost loved ones to Alzheimer's, I wish you strength and peace.

Vincent, actually I went through a similar thing: I�d been the (almost) single care-taker for my mother in the last three months of her life. There are about 150 frames, b&w, most of them with poor light. You would find some of those pictures frightening or appalling because in the last couple of weeks she was so tired of her condition she looks out of her mind. I even photographed her on the last day when she was agonizing, and right after she died � that was at home. Was it cynical or not, is hard for me to tell (I leave out many details), but these 150 images are the most important thing for me, not only personally, but photographically too � if you know what I mean.

The following is short extract from John Bergers book"ABOUT LOOKING". It is from the chapter entitled"Photographs of Agony". It was written in 1972 the subject then being Vietnam. He asks the question:

 

What effects do such photographs have?

 

Many people would argue that such photographs remind us shockingly of the reality, the lived reality, behind the abstractions of political theory, casualty statistics and news bulletins. Such photographs are printed on the black curtain that is drawn across what we choose to forget or refuse to know.They serve as an eye we cannot shut.

 

Yet what is it they make us see?

 

They bring us up short.They are arresting. We are seized by them.As we look at them, the moment of the others suffering engulfs us. We are filled with either despair or indignation. Despair takes on the others suffering to no purpose. Indignation demands action. We try to emerge from the moment of the photograph back into our lives. As we do so the resumption of our lives seems to be a hopelessly inadequate response to what we have just seen.

 

The truth is that any response to the photographed moment is bound to be felt as inadequate. Those who are there in the situation being photographed are not seeing the moment as we have and their responses are of an altogether different order. It is not possible for anyone to look pensively at such a moment and emerge stronger.There is no sense of before and after the moment.

 

The person who has been arrested by the photograph is confronted by his own personal inadequacy which may shock him as much as the atrocity committed.

 

Berger wrote these comments in 1972 nearly 30 years ago

One type of photo that I've come to object to is the (cliched) shot of a parent or spouse or relative who has just found out a loved one is dead. I consider it to be intrusive, no better than a papprazzi shot of a topless celebrity.

 

Of course that person reacts with grief, and great emotion: I knew that, I don't need to see it, and the subject certainly doesn't need me to see them in tears and agony to know they hurt. They didn't ask for the situation, but here's some newspaper running a shot of them at their least attractive, in an incredibly private moment, for the tittilation of yahoos.

 

It's disgusting

<p>Making people <i>feel</i> rather than <i>think</i> is about the most honest

connection I think you can make with someone. Pain as a type of feeling is the

universal from of comprehension--no thinking required.</p>

<p>Vincent, like others I would like to say that I am deeply touched by your

decision to lovingly document your reflections on this part of your wife's life.

As recognised, these may forever remain as just deeply personal reflections on

your wife and yourself, for yourself or you may at some stage feel strong enough

to gift some of these photos to allow others to experience this deeply personal

experience of love not loss.</p>

<p>I think when photojournalists make photos of grieving loved ones it is usually to "slap"

the viewer in the face with the sense of grief at that person's loss. I think

that's why we have such a strong reaction to it because we don't like to be

reminded of other people's hurt as it's too confronting--raw. The other side of

the coin is that overexposure to too many instances of this can lead to

desensitisation. We are bombarded with the plight of the less fortunate and

suffering masses on a daily basis with the inherent risk that eventually we

become immune to it; until it happens to us. I think honestly, this is the real

reason we don't like to be confronted with personal grief is that it serves as

the painful reminder that we will some day experience this sense of loss

too--guaranteed.</p>

<p>My latest photo <i><b>untitled (girl and swing #4)</b>.</i> In this photo you

can choose to experience either the pain of loss or the joy of life--either way it's your choice.</p>

<p>

<img border="0" src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/4505874-lg.jpg" width="680" height="557"></p>

<p>Cheers...John</p>

Hmmm a tough call. It would seem that many of the most well known photographs in the photojournalism sense are those that show human suffering. The image of the naked girl being burned by napalm comes to mind. The trouble with this as I see it is that some photographers may seek out suffering as a way to try to make a name for themselves. This is when the exploitation factor can come into being. I guess each photographer will have to decide for themselves why they are taking the picture. I'm having this issue right now in fact. You see, I'm mostly interested in documentary photography. As such I'm always on the look out for new subjects. When a co-worker started to talk to me about her grandfather who is in a nursing home with dementia I asked her if she would take me to him so I can shoot a roll of him. She said that would be fine. However, I now cannot really think of a good reason for this. It was maybe an automatic response. I mean he's a stranger, and I doubt his family would be interested in any prints of their loved one in such a state assuming this particular day I shoot he is having a bad day. I lived with my grandmother for a few years and she came down with Alzhiemers and it was very difficult. Avedon got a lot of flack for the photos he took of his dying father. So peoples own convictions also play huge role in how such work is received. I once met a guy who told me his barber is a holocaust survivor. So I had him take me to meet this very friendly elderly gentleman who told me his story and showed me the numbers on his arm. He allowed me to come back the next day and photograph him in the barber shop which I did. The resulting work was a failure though since there was nothing in the pictures to suggest this mans history. They looked like a picture that could have been taken anywhere, that of a elderly barber sitting in a barbers chair. That was about two years ago and whenever the contact sheet surfaces and I look at it, it's always with a sense of puzzlement. I wanted these pictures to say something but I just didn't know what. Maybe they would have if I saw this man as he was at the present time and not as just a historical figure of one of mankinds darkest moments.

You're right, Marc, the hardest thing to do is to communicate your perceptions through a photograph, especially when you're attempting to reveal tragedy. You really have my sympathy over the barber story. I shot the attached picture to illustrate a piece my wife wrote for her column. At first glance, it's just a picture of a man holding an old-fashioned razor. It's only when the article reveals that he survived one of the worst Japanese P.O.W. camps and made the razor right under the noses of the Japs that the picture becomes what the French refer to as 'un document'.

 

I also take your point about putting the holocaust survivor in the present context. When my wife's piece was run, they also used another picture showing Bert with a clock he'd made, which bridged the gap between past and present. You're right though, it's a dilema every time one shoots this sort of story and I'm glad I no longer have to do it if I feel uncomfortable.<div></div>

I guess since I have no pain, then I can't be discussed?

 

Question. What's this facination with pain?<div></div>

Who's talking about fascination?

When something is spoke about in great quanity (angst or pain as an example) it's because there's a fascination. Why make movie after screen play after written story or opera, unless there's a facination.

 

We couch these truth's in denials of obscurity so as to hide the self-evidentary truths rather than deal with the genisis. It's more entertaining this way yet the facts are undeniable just the same.

Thanks for your kind words H.P.

I guess the facination with pain is that it's human nature. For example how many of you slow down to check out a wreck on the freeway? Quite a few if I may base this statement on the way traffic backs up almost a mile here on LA freeways whenever there's a wreck which is almost daily. LOL as if LA traffic wasn't bad enough already. So why do we slow down to look at a wreck? I asked my mother this once when I was a boy and we were inching along past a wreck. She said it was because seeing someone else in a worse off situation makes a lot of people feel lucky it's not them. I'm not sure I agree with this but as I mentioned above it's human nature.

"For example how many of you slow down to check out a wreck on the freeway?"

 

And how many of these same said folks are slowing down because emergency vehicles are on the roadway flashing their lights, people are walking around on the freeway, lanes are being narrowed up and one's suppose to, rightfully, slow down for safety purposes or would you rather everybody just plow into each other?

 

I guess the same slowing down case of fascination could be made for a construction site. (Taking poetic license here) I see, if it's a construction site, it's safety and if it's an accident, it's rubbernecking:)

 

Checking out what's going on around one's world, a fascination does not make.

 

Sometimes a person's just gotta slow down their rate of speed including at the scene of an "accident" cause it's the right/safe thing to do and this slowing down has nothing to do with facination with pain. But intentionally focusing (no pun intended) on people's pain, physical or mental, is a fascination.

Well said, Thomas. There's an irritating tendency here in the UK for the radio traffic commentators to talk about 'rubberneckers' slowing traffic around accident sites. As you say, though, it's only good sense to reduce your speed when you see a flashing light or other hazard, lest you end up as a statistic yourself.

That's becoming an exciting thread - talking traffic stuff, that's cool.

"...talking traffic stuff, that's cool."

 

Not sure of the intent of your above.

 

 

Just incase you missed the connection, reread the last couple of comments as there's a tie in between accidents, rubbernecking, the physical tragedy an accident causes along with people's propensity to want to see/photograph this phenomenon and a mother's comments to her son in regard to same.

 

Myself, I don't do tragedy as to me, that's exploitation for purpose of sensationalism.

Yes, I saw the connection.

Sergei,when I read the post I saw right away a larger context for photography and pain. To me it makes so much sense that artists go after the wounded. If we had no wounds,we would have no sensitivity. No sensitivity means no empathy,the basis for shared love for art.

If Hamlet could not suffer,what to write about. 'Well my uncle poisoned my old man and has gone after mom..that's a bummer,but it's, like, what do you expect?" No more tragedy. Maybe photographers have trouble expressing deep anguish, except in a photojournalism sense and then it gets called exploitation so often. Maybe the still image doesn't capture it. I don't know. (Magnolia was an interesting film. I thought so too.)

I don't know I'd call it a "fascination" with pain, but there are certain kinds of suffering that

are foreign to us as Americans, but probably need to be seen. Last night I searched a

name I saw in another thread - a photographer named Natchwey. I could only look at so

much, but I called my 12 year old son to see the horrid picture of a Sudanese living

skeleton, crawling in the dirt. It was shocking to me. I didn't know a human could live to

be in this condition.

 

It puts our materialistic world in perspective and I hoped it would for my son who is

suffering terribly because I'm requiring he earn & save his own money for an Ipod.

 

I want him to learn to give of himself and I think it's important he know the conditions

most of the world lives in. (That's why we took him to Guatemala last summer. I think he

needs another trip.) America is not the norm.

 

Reality for some is light years away from reality for others.

 

Don't get me wrong, I know everyone suffers in some way eventually. Life isn't always

easy but it only takes a little travel to realize how good we've got it. Yes?

 

Vincent, I admire you for the care you give your wife. I know "difficult" doesn't describe it.

God bless you!

"If we had no wounds,we would have no sensitivity."

 

Really? So then I should cut myself, emotionally/physically to remind myself not to cut myself?

 

Emotional sensitivity is an innate human emotion most work hard to cover up cause sensitivity to others is considered a weakness by many and fails to serve egocentric behavior. One also needs to steel themselves to pain or they wouldn't be able to function due to the amount of pain they're surrouded by but it doesn't make them insensitive.

 

"I want him to learn to give of himself and I think it's important he know the conditions most of the world lives in."

 

To me, it's important one learns as to what gives rise to the acceptance of those who would create and allow such conditions to exist and give them the strength to confront, physically, head on, the bullies who would cause humans to exist in these conditions.

 

But this digresses from the original context of photographing pain.

 

I see folks talking about pain, I see exploitation of pain, I see little willingness to photographically confront the root cause of emotional pain; egocentric behavior.

Thomas, glad to see you're back and feeling better.

Janet, I was very impressed with your post. Your son may not appreciate what you're doing now but I'm sure he will, later.

 

Thomas, I think your argument is entirely valid and there are certainly photographers who exploit pain as you say. There are others whose work reveals pain, in a way that challenges our assumptions. Don McCullin's work in Biafra or W. Eugene Smith's pictures of the Minimata victims are two cases that stick in my mind.