black and white: then to now "The 'Invisible' Destitute Elderly Make Themselves ''Visible': 'Life Without a Safety Net'"

The recent economic crisis and a 40-60% fall in the value of Ukraine's

currency have eaten away at already weakened pensions, so this

woman (and others) have taken to the streets and public thoroughfares

for sustenance. This woman has planted herself at the base of an

escalator leading to one of Kyiv's most traveled Metro stations. Your

ratings and critiques are invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly

or very critically, or just wish to be heard, please submit a helpful and

constructive comment; please share your photographic knowledge to

help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! John

The strength of the message "jumping" out of this picture is really exceptional.

I do not want to dissect it, it is not necessary. The static helplessness of the old lady is but too evident in contrast with the dynamics of what happens around her.

Very good (and you know that I do not flatter, not you and not anybody).

Hello John,

 

This picture punches you in the face - hard.

The stillness of the subject, with her well chosen centred position, opposes the movement of the crowd very effectively.

This is a very effective and affective shot John, and, for me, right up there at the top of your pile. The image that you have created makes a point in a very effective way.

The only (small) criticism is that the black mark in the lower left districts a little. (But, that is a very small point).

 

Cheers

 

Rob

Every once in a while in my peregrinations, I happen across an idea (yes an idea) that occurs to me, and this was one.

 

Anybody could have taken this phone and nearly everybody on this escalator had a camera phone capable of taking this photo (albeit low quality of course, but you get the idea.)

 

I guess the point is not my photo skills but my ability to 'see' and then 'see' and aim a camera and record (with some great regularity) that which some find in life significant but otherwise ordinary, and to which many turn away.

 

And most of my photos are about life (and composition), and if you notice this has very well thought out composition -- balance, and unbalance (just a little) -- all those faces coming at her, increasingly blurry for subject motion - relative speed to her -- avoiding her, and just a few going the direction she's faced with the majority coming directly toward her.

 

In her demure elderly personality, frail (I looked at her clearly from the front as I gave her some money, but NOT for being a photo subject), I realized that she had decided to Confront a major part of Kyiv's population with her destitution, and to do so in a way both dignified and totally lacking in dignity (if you understand that both can be done and embodied in one person at once).

 

This is a first for me, I think.

 

I've taken heads and subjects from every angle of rich and poor, but never from the rear except one man, in Paris, reading a book (possibly for tryst judging from the book's text) who is looking over his shoulder)

 

I never had dared to take a photo in which the subject's face, unknown to any, was entirely obscured - turned from the viewing audience.

 

In a way, it reminds me (in that vein) of Henri Cartier-Bresson's photo of the famed labor leader taken (John L. Lewis) as he spoke to a vast audience of union activists, all taken from the rear, but we know the leader. (from memory so I may be wrong) by his abundant, flyaway hair.

 

Anyway, you get the point and the point is the only way to compare HCB and his greatness with the smallness of me.

 

He did it all, which I recognized at age 22, and which drove me out of photography as a career (true story), something you can read about elsewhere here.

 

But there are still good photos to take now that he's stopped taking them by 38 years and dead now for five.

 

Thank you for your encouragement and support Luca; there's no way to get that except by good photography and being 'honest' in presentation - no tricks.

 

John (Crosley)

Those are words I hadn't thought of.

 

I honestly thought this somewhat subtle since I didn't actually show what this woman looks like -- at least her face.

 

(Though I did stop to give her a little money -- less than $2 in local currency but all I had otherwise were VERY large bills and I needed them for rent, Internet. etc.)

 

She was very thankful, but didn't look, just stuffed them in her purse and still begging - didn't want to lose a captive crowd.

 

I did take one photo of two old women begging together than assuredly had 'punch' but literally no one opened it - it was entirely evident on thumbnail so no one went to the trouble to 'open'.

 

Even until now.

 

I do not make a specialty of poor people and beggars, but there's ART where there are people and they are PEOPLE, not some detritus from society.

 

And they are stationary in a fast-moving world, as well as helping make 'social statements, for each one of who passes is making his/her own statement, and I just might be there capturing that.

 

;~))

 

As ART with capitals.

 

I hope.

 

Best to you and thanks for sharing your insight.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)

 

 

An extremely powerful, moving and affective image. The old woman has turned her back on the photographer as the nation has turned their collective backs on her. The population moves past her in a hurried blur.

Most well done, congratulations.

 

Regards,

GF Kremer

I take all sorts of photos and often have high hopes for so many of them.

 

This one was without regard for ratings or anything else. It was personal and expresses 'me'.

 

Apparently sometimes I get things right.

 

Thanks so much for the words of encouragement.

 

(and I had thought it was somewhat 'subtle' when I took it, thinking when I posted it, 'how many on Photo.net will get it?'

 

Stupid me.

 

Thanks again.

 

John (Crosley)

John, I see this one, as much of your work, quite interesting. We can almost put ourself into the stream and feel the plodding stance of the old woman. And see the contrast with here heavy shoes and sagging hose and old style coat with house coat dress hanging out agaist the more hip younger crowd. The other thing is the almost sterile and polished temple of the subway as the Russians apparently see such public works. The polished rails the well designed lights on the escalators. What I do not see so much is a sense of the place without knowing where it is . So it is generic, and being that, I am not sure it fit your intent. I also could appreciate it as a color study, because I imagine the domed spaces are rather beautiful as urban architecture. I always have some interest in Kiev since I have some heritage in Ukraine. Father born in Zhitomir. Emigrated early part of the last century. Ukrainian is in my blood somewhere....beauty and stoicism together in this one...age is not for the faint hearted, they say...I am finding out. aloha, gerry

It is an interesting point you make about the woman's 'plodding stance' and your heritage.

 

The Ukrainians include a huge number of native Russian speakers, and Russian was THE language of Ukraine during Soviet times; now in schools at least,it's Ukrainian, a mostly dead language for some, but a point in which the government can try to differentiate itself from its giant neighbor - so it teaches in Ukrainian now instead of Russian.

 

A century and a half ago, as one Russian-born Ukrainian explained to me, almost all were slaves - they were called serfs - but they really were slaves.

 

For all the Soviets' legend and epic misdeeds, they educated the masses and with great speed brought them into the 20th Century during the 20th Century, though both countries were in the countryside quite poor. Still they had a world class space program, world class military (the better to Nuke us in the US with) and so forth.

 

But in essence they educated the populace out of their own government, a trick the Communist Chinese are trying to avoid. The Communist government of the Soviet Union just fell apart Christmas 1991, and Ukraine became independent.

 

The women of Ukraine are famously beautiful and often quite petite, but the men on the other hand are often very large, often large-boned and very often have HUGE hands, all the better for the males to have worked the fields or worked with implements. There may have over time been some genetic natural selection,something I'm reminded of so frequently when I shake giant hand. (I do have small hands, anyway,but here they feel miniature when I shake many men's hands).

 

But women's hands, feel 'normal' as that word is used in English (in Russian 'normal' means OK).

 

You are right about the coat and the housecoat showing underneath, the rumpled hosiery, a cardinal sin if you're a fashion-conscious Ukrainian women as almost all women pride themselves on their mostly wonderful good looks (until after childbirth women start turning fat, no longer needing to 'snag a husband'.

 

She it's unfashionable in a city of fashionably slender young women, and that's her further humiliation, and it probably is something of which she's aware and has had to make an internal compromise with in order to eat.

 

In the USA, she'd probably be getting off a jetliner fresh from some cruise somewhere in her golden years, then off to her hairdresser for a touchup.

 

I see such people all the time when I travel.

 

This woman assuredly has a pension, but even if it has been supplemented, the local currency in relation to the dollar dropped from a steady 5 to the (inflating) dollar where it stayed for five years to about 8 to the dollar now, making everything local except housing quite cheap for me,but not for her,, and busting a number of banks (as well as worldwide.)

 

If she had savings in a bank, it may have gone bust.

 

The cost of credit, even for those with good credit is 40% OR MORE, but even with such inflation,the banks may lose, as the return from lent money has not keep up with the fall of the local currency last Christmas time - a time known as the 'crisis'. [the currency appears stable now, but is tied to a falling dollar in people's minds at least, not the rising Euro. (pronounced hereabouts as Yevro)

 

Putin in neighboring Russia raised everyone's pensions nationwide, which brought him great popularity (he already had much with his Russian nationalism), but on the other hand, my ex-father-in-law (who LOVES Putin) mentions they have to pay for utilities, for maintenance, and for health care(?), things which formerly were free.

 

So, give with one hand, reap the rewards and take away with the other? No matter,though, Putin has helped the average Russian greatly and helped erase the policies of the doddering Yeltsin, who was popular but under whose regime small to large organized crime resulted in Russians being terrorized everywhere.

 

Love him or hate him, Putin (and his successor) have not hurt the average Russian, and there could have been worse and his policies have given them some security in their day to day existence.

 

As to our aged great grandmother here, she probably can only see her empty cupboard with her pension check, once being 'according to her needs' under Soviet theory now being not enough for more than a few days sustenance.

 

So, she does what she has to do.

 

And I do also.

`

And what I do in the end, probably helps those like her . . . . I think (rationalizing?)

 

Thanks Gary; like you, I also am 'getting older', but I am like Whoopi Goldberg, who, when asked if she was discriminated against (being black), responded, 'No, I never tell anybody I'm black'. ;~)).

 

I just mostly don't tell anybody my age and act younger.

 

Often people refuse to believe my true age; I've been called a 'liar' to my face, many times, especially in Ukraine (passport resolves the issue).

 

John (Crosley)

This also does look good in color, but posted in B&W in keeping with my general reliance on B&W.

 

Also, with color, there are issues of different frequencies of ambient light depending on the light source,,and resulting in somewhat varying levels of blue to yellows (not easily compensated for).

 

(of course I am referrring to varying 'color temperatures')

 

John (Crosley)

Very good work ,excellent b/w .

It is good to see your name here. When you are away for a while, I miss your comments.

 

Thank you so much for the compliment.

 

john

 

John (Crosley)