"Coal Hollow" -- Ken Light's rangefinder photos of West Virginia

[kent_tolley2]

Thank you Michael for this link. It would be extremely difficult if not impossible to find a second for any suggestion that you are belligerent. Just the opposite in my opinion. <BR><BR>I disagree with Michael Hoffmanﾒs criticism that these pictures are not a fair representation of the lives of these people and I disagree with his insistence on what the photographers intent is or ought to be and how he should accomplish that intent. I think that's presumptuous. <BR><BR> What is abundantly clear by the responses on this thread is that these pictures disturb the viewer and they are successful to the degree in which they are able to do that. I bookmarked the site itself and look forward to returning. Thank you.

[kent_tolley2]

All the American publishers criticized Robert Frank's photos for The Americans as not being a fair representation of America in the 50's and subsequently he had to go to Europe to get the book published. Frank was shooting <b>his vision</b> of America. In the same way, I think, Ken Light is shooting his vision of Appalachia.

[mattalofs]

I've never been to West Virginia or any other part of Appalachia, but in many ways these photos remind me of places not too far from my childhood home in southern Missouri. Having recently done an extended photo project of people in Missouri living in circumstances not much different than these, I suspect that the photographs would probably be well received by the subjects, but that folks would wonder why they aren't in color. I tried to get prints to all of my subjects, and probably half of them asked me if they could get the pictures in color.

 

While many have commented on how disturbing these pictures are, I see a fair amount of humor in most of them. The technical execution is excellent as well. Thanks for posting the link.

[thomas_sullivan]

excellent pics........both Ken Light and Doug. I also have Shelby Lee Adams Video where you see the pics for his book about Appalachia, and also in the video part it shows just how much of a friend he is with these people. I believe he also grew up in that area.

 

As far as the life styles go........judging solely from Adams's video....there is no way at least he was faking it. If you don't see it in the stills of his, you WILL see it in the video.

[tim hyde]

This debate about whether an artist is exploiting or accurately depicting downtrodden subjects (even that term is normative, alas), is at least as old as Dickens. Condescension is the related accusation. Our art is explotiative, for better or worse, and when it is done well it SHOULD lead to these discussions.

[jtk]

I don't see Coal Hollow being more exploitative than "aesthetic" nudes, romanticized visions of nature (calendar art/Sierra Magazine) or trumped-up wedding photos.

[kent_tolley2]

I think photographing people is inherently exploitive. If you can express something worthwhile or meaningful it's worth it to me. Just please treat them with respect.

[cosina_snap]

An interesting interview with Ken and Melanie light about Coal Hollow can be found <a href="http://www.kqed.org/epArchive/R602091000">here</a>

[beau 1664876222]

Very good photos. Don, I also liked some of yours a lot.

 

This thread has some thoughtful comments about the inherent tensions of documentary photography. Little anecdote: when I was a teenager, I happened to meet some people who had just been photographed by Richard Avedon for his "American West" series. Each of these people was quite aggrieved about how they and their friends had been portrayed, saying, in effect, "he treated us real nice, but it turns out he was out to make us look as ugly as possible." So knowing nothing about photography, I grew up with this idea that there was this prick named Avedon who betrayed these kind folks with unkind photographs for his own gain. Of course, I later saw the "West" photos and cannot deny their power; I think the series is a masterpiece. Nevertheless, my prior view of Avedon might not have been so wrong! The question is, to whom does a documentary photographer owe a duty, and what is it?

[x-ray]

The duty of the documatary photography is an honest representation of the subject. This is subject to the perception that the photographer has of the subject. Each of us will treat a particular subject, photographically, in a different manner. We all see the subject in a different way.

 

http://www.photo.net/photos/X-Ray

[jtk]

Beau, your critique of Avedon might apply equally to Picasso.

 

The more I learn about each of them, the more that rings true for me...because he was a photographer and I understood what he was doing, I "liked" Avedon long before I was blown away by Picasso (at the Picasso-Matisse traveling exhibit).

 

I don't think Avedon was "unkind" to his West subjects, I think he honored them, just as he honored Billy Graham and Eisenhower decades earlier by showing them to be frail humans, our equals.

[tim hyde]

John Kelly, here is where I must amiably disagree. In that series, I side with the contemporary critics who felt that Avedon was not merely exploitative but cruel. He shot 17,000 images for that series and used only 124 of them, selecting only the freakiest of the lot. And we are not talking about the dignified "freaks" of Diane Arbus, but rural homespuns caught in a bad light, the very antithesis of the high-fashion world he had done so much to create. Yes, I think our art necessarily exploits its subjects, but as you suggest, it works only if we honor them in the process. In that series, Avedon did not.

[sprouty]

<I>"...I think our art necessarily exploits its subjects, but as you suggest, it works only if we honor them in the process. In that series, Avedon did not."</I>

<P>

Are you familiar with <a href="http://www.dfw.com/multimedia/dfw/news/archive/avedon/index.html#preload">this site?</a>

<P>

It doesn't appear as though his subjects would agree with your assessment.

[sprouty]

Sorry, that should have been "would <I>NOT</I> agree with your assessment."

[sprouty]

Actually it's too early for me to be typing anything resembling an opinion. Just click on the link and make up your own mind.

[brambor]

SP - what a great link! Thank You. Much appreciated.

[tim hyde]

Wow. An artists' subjects are notorious co-conspirators in this kind of exploitation, but in this case I'm going to have to reassess. I need to think about it more, but my whole view of this project is in doubt after listening to these voices. Thanks for this incredible link.