'Kyiv, Ukraine, Toy Assault Military Weapon -- Emblematic of the Times?'

The Russians are Coming! A Second Time! Or they aren't,

depending on whom you believe. The Ukrainians only have 6,000

battle ready soldiers as the Russians mass 40,000 of their best

troops on the Ukrainian--Russian border but disclaim (as before) any

territorial objective, and this man carries a toy assault rifle, which

may sum up the situation in its absurdity. Ukraine is not part of

NATO, and part of the Western strategy includes talk, sanctions

against Russia, visa withholding, bank asset seizures, and flooding

the world market with US strategic oil reserves to hurt Petro-State

Russia which is 50% dependent on Petro revenue for its taxes to

keep the state programs, and flooding the market with US oil would

supposedly sow disaster on the Russian economy . . . . . and the

Ukrainians are going about life right now as though it were 'normal'

though tents remain in Kyiv city center (a few have disappeared, but

not many.)

Your ratings, critiques and observations are invited and most

welcome. If you rate harshly, very critically, or wish to make a

remark, please submit a helpful and constructive comment; please

share your photographic knowledge to help improve my

photography. Thanks! Enjoy! john (I'm a neutral observer, this is for

Ukrainians, Russians and the West to figure out, not me.) john

A little sad. So much corruption in the government, so much tension and danger in the air. The people of Kiev overthrow one corrupt government only to have another swoop in and seize the Crimea. Your photograph, knowing what I see, captures the poignancy of this period.

As I read your interesting and excellent comment, I am watching a video of Garry Winogrand and him stating that all photos that supposedly 'tell stories' are a 'lie' because photos are mute.

He's a fellow Columbia student and supposedly a 'grad' from a time before myself, and possibly if I'd known he was walking the streets of Manhattan when I first took up photography like some of the other greats of 'street', I wouldn't have felt like somehow I'd 'invented' what it is I do, as I escaped from reading a 'book a week, for each of my five classes my senior year at Columbia, before I got shot and student rioters shut down the school for the year and I left later for Viet Nam with a camera.

I'd have liked to engage Winogrand just on the subject of whether ALL photos, such as this, which I contend is very emblematic, 'tell lies' even though Winogrand says 'all photos are mute' and the meaning lies within our heads.  

Of course, photos don't have brains and voice boxes, but some stimulate and others stimulate nothing but maybe erogenous zones, Tide purchases, or just a big yawn, as most snapshots do to me, and photos of cats (such as the guy at the bus stop cornered me into looking at tonight on his Sony Alpha -- cats, cats, cats, and more cats, plus a few great shots of an inverted child captured upside down doing gymnastics in some yard/woods area -- caught in the middle of amazing spread-leg flips.)

I think this is the photo of the times, and so when in a dense crowd I spied the toy gun mostly hidden, I chased along after this man (his child to whom the gun belongs is hidden in front of and beside him along with wifey), to get the shot, with some forgettable frames, and just this one able shot fully showing the swinging gun NOT in a blur as the crowd thinned out.

I admire Winogrand's intellectual nature, and would have loved to engage him had he lived past his mid 50s, particularly about photos such as this.

Thanks for the kind comment which is very much appreciated.

john

John (Crosley)

You meant, Kiev Ukrajna, not "Kyiv, Ukraine". The only reason, that can't be in the US, because the guy would be shoot dead in the next minutes and we never had a subway station as nice as the Russians haw all over in big cities. Picture telling a thousand words, but, we are lazy to read all the pages.

Aside from quibbles over spelling of the country, you are entirely correct.

Aces to you for your interpretation of this photo, and for understanding both its meaning and its relation to the two comparative cultures -- the US and the cultures of former Soviet countries and the United States at least in regard to their attitudes toward 'crime', firearms, and also 'mass transit'.

I'm happy to see a comment from you; don't be a stranger.

A photo like this 'low rates', but not for want of content, I think, but possibly for the same reason you articulate - plus one rater was a 'spoiler' -- a really low rater who brought down the averages plenty.

Oh, well, the picture's the same, and high in my regard, and I thank you for letting me know you were stimulated to thought by it -- a high accolade for me.

john

John (Crosley)