Nagasaki in 1945. It marked the end of world war ii but marks the beginning of the cold war. Nuclear dread, Nuclear Anxiety hovered over the conflict during the 1950s and 1960s and even up to the 1980s to the end of the conflict. A fitting image to begin our class today. Today we think a lot about photography during the cold war, specifically american photography during the cold war. Imagine a week or two or even course of the subject think about general themes as well as case studies and in the meantime talk about some advances in Media Technology and how newspapers were printing photographs during these years. Before we get into photography, should make sure we understand what the cold war is. As we get further and further removed from it becomes more fuzzy and the collective unconscious. Of course the cold war was the ideological battle between the United States and the soviet union. Which began after world war ii, around 1945 and goes all the way to 1989. Then, of course, the allies were involved as well. American allies and soviet allies were also involved in this conflict. It turn on a central question whats ideology, whose world view should be the primary sort of factor in postwar world war ii development. Should it be capitalism and democracy with emphasis on individual liberty or communism with interest and desire for economic and social equality . This conflict between these two world views did dominate the global scene during the cold war. And, you know, we call at any time cold war and theres no direct military conflict between the soviets and americans but calling it cold isnt accurate. There are many proxy wars whether in korea where American Forces were battling north korean force and Chinese Force but with soviet support or in vietnam where american soldiers were fighting the north vietnamese with soviet support. There were lots of casualties and brutal regimes that emerged during the cold war. So technically not cold. Cold for american and soviets but not cold overall. It ended in 1989. In november 1989 when the berlin wall suddenly came down and a couple of years later the soviet union dissolved in 1991. Putting the nails in the coffin of the cold war. Of course now talking about a new cold war, different class and different topic. This is a really good image to start our discussion today. Aerial photograph. If you already recognize where im going with this, keep those ideas to the side and look at the image. Lets try to see what we actually can reckon creately. What are some sort of features of this landscape we can see. Anyone . Yeah. Noah. [ inaudible ] we see landscape certainly right here. Maybe some topography right here. Anybody else . Karen . [ inaudible ] we see trees right here, we see roads and such right here. We see sort of basic things, trees, roads, topography and am biggous objects here and there. This photograph is boring or doesnt have any excitement or not very consequential. When we think about what this photograph, how it functioned and what it depicts it becomes one of the most consequential photographs in the 20th century. It was taken by the american spy plane high above communist controlled cuba in october 1962. And be accurate interpretation of this photograph led to bringing the world to the brink of nuclear apocalypse. What you see here when analysts that took the film from the u2 spy camera and miles of film, a photograph that is much of the cuban landscape and analysts go through it with armagnifying glasses. This paragraph proved to american analysts soviets were introducing offense weapons to cuba 90 miles off the coast of florida which gave them advantageous first strike capability. When president kennedy was looking at these images in the oval office they dont have captions on them. Imagine this image without the guides right here. And kennedy was bewildered. Number one he didnt see, recognize missiles, didnt recognize offensive weapons there. Secondly he was concerned when these photographs would be presented to the American People, that the photographs themselves wouldnt justify bringing the americans to the brink of destruction, the threat of world war iii. So he was really sort of bewildered and worried about these photographs. So what happened of that people put these captions inside and all of a sudden you can begin to recognize these sort of identifying, the offending objects here. Like launching equipment. Looked like missiles now that we have the texts assigned the home. This is how they were presented to the public whether on newspapers or television, this is the images the American People saw. And for me its a fitting introduction to understanding photography during the cold war. I think we can see theres a desire or necessity for clarity and political truth during the conflict. But also at the same time were fighting against ideas of photography inherent ambiguity. Photographs can misdirect. Heres these two ideas of truth and photographing ambiguity or dialing against each other. Really we can see how, you know, a photograph like this, how ones ideology, ones belief system can make certain images true or seem like facts. And perhaps a strange comparison or a fitting one for this idea, think of the rorschach ink test. You see these in movies and therapy sessions where we begin to show the workings of ones personal mind. Wlu see an manual or a rug here. You know its up to the individual viewer. In some ways a photograph like this, you know, you see right here your ideology, again your world view will determine how you see it. If you were a soviet viewer of this image you might be skeptical. This could be doctored or forged. So my suggestion is there were missiles in cuba. Thats fact. This photograph doesnt necessarily communicate that idea to the untrained eye is my larger point here. This idea of sort of slippery images, images meaning one thing or another at the same time was captured by the cold war historian john lewis in thinking about the conflict as a whole. The cold war as itself as a whole, john gattis saw it as a slipper aand eper and ambiguou. So its suggesting between illusion and reality was not always obvious. Theres confusion between ideas of fact and fiction. Think of nuclear deterrence. In some ways whats more important, whats as important as the actual number of war heads one has in ones arsenal is project the illusion of having many. So as long as the soviets believe we had many missiles that secret ad deterrent. So the illusion versus actual fact is important. And cold war between the americans and soviet. Hot wars elsewhere. Idea of a cold war facilitates a battle of images, of information, not so much military force. In the battle of information images, photography is a crucial battlefield during the cold war and this is what well be talking about today. We see this battle even in something like, you know, senator Joseph Mccarthys actions in the early 1950s in america. You might know senator mccarthy became charging thousands of communists who had infiltrated the highest levels of american government. And to do so you see this photograph taken in the u. S. Congress. He is literally using photographs to prove some kind of relationship between someone and a communist. And so hes using photographs for evidence in one of these hearings. But lets turn our attention to this photograph right here. I put the identifying figures at the bottom of the image because mccarthys aides, his assistants distributed a copy of this photograph widely in maryland in 1950. And it shows a maryland senator, miller tightings right here talking closely and in depth with the leader of the American Communist Party earl broward. Mccarthy introduced this photograph to discredit the senator. It cost the senator his senate seat. Oh, yeah he must be a communist sympathizer hes talking to this important american communist. Actually this photograph is a fake, a composite photograph. As you see here this featured from life magazine that exposes the radius. You have tighting listening to the radio right here. Earl broward talking to someone. They collide these fravgs listening, someone talk and then get rid of the radio and you have an image that appears, creates the illusion, fictional illusion that these two figures were in some kind of deep conversation. So, again you can see how under the guise of clinical fact, a photograph signifies these are truth and fact. Crafty politicians with bring a brandnew reality through these techniques of photo montage. They are more prevalent today with photo shop and photographs are wreaking havoc back in the early 1950s. Also you can see how certain photographs can be used as propaganda by both sides, same photograph to be used as propaganda by the communist as well a capitalists. The photograph ill show you a little bit graphic. I want to prove this point. Its an interesting case study. I apologize for the graphic nature of the photograph. Here we see a corps ranging from a tree in hungary. Pro democracy protesters were fighting against the communist government and forces in 1956. That sort of protest is brutally put down with many, many deaths. But basically we dont know who is hang. Said communist happening from tree or a pro democracy, sort of pro democracy protester . We dont know who committed the atrocity. Both sides use this photograph as evidence of sort of the brutality and the barbaricness of the other side. The same photograph can serve two masters. Can be communist propaganda, soviet propaganda as well as american propaganda. So already you can see a great example of the ways a photograph, same factual image can be used to prove two Different Things and this continue the tenacious, battle of information of images thats the cold war. So a question at this point. Yeah, will. A reflex of the photo that we just saw. Kind of reminds me of the image, of the sharpshooter we see during the American Revolution of the civil war. Great point. Alice gardner photograph, the rebel sharpshooter the same body was dragged from one location to another. It was a confederate in one picture and a Union Soldier in another. Issues are not old but sort of take on new relevance during the cold war. Any other questions or comments. So now i want to turn to the reading we did for today. Well touch on the big points of this important essay. Of course you read already this semester and talk about photography and memory and those sorts of issues. Back in 1961, roland bart was a thinker to examine press photography from this angle. His essay of the photographic message. We can understand newspapers use photography in the way newspapers could mislead or try to influence its readers through sort of subtle twisting of photographic measures. This is the first line, two sentences of the essay. Its an important one to get us in the mood of what roland bart up to. Can we get a volunteer to read it out loud for us . The photograph is a image formed by sources [ inaudible ] thank you. What hes saying here resembles what is a shadow diagram. Design or thought up by the map technician. What you see here in this diagram we have an information source and have a destination. And in between you have the transmitter of receiver but this the crucial part, the noise source. Any message, any transmitted message or some kind of distortion corrupts that message even just a little bit on the other side. So think about that game you played in kindergarten, i did. The telephone game. You whisper something in the ear of the first child and goes all the way down the line to the last child. Just say you say billy takes a bath. First one in the end its like billy takes a laugh. In that transmission from the first child to the last child we have this noise source, the way the message itself deteriorates somewhat and changes through the act of transmission. So bart in this opening quote shows his interest in the ideas about information and how its corrupted between the source and destination. And this gets to sort of a larger, more general point. The press photograph from bart is not straightforward. Its a complex object. We can begin to think about the complicated ways it signifies and produces meaning to the reader. Then another important quote from the essay. I want to talk about this idea, i need a volunteer to read this short quote. Thanks. The photograph can be seen as the could exists of two messages. One without a code and the other with a code. Its kind of confusing. This idea of without a code. Press photography is an image without a code. What he means by this i suggest on the screen here, bart is saying untilage itse jaag jaaga is not code but needs to be code through captions, articles next to it. Through many other ideas like the readers own political persuasion. Untilage becomes largely meaningless until it becomes coded by these surrounding ideas. In some ways the image without a code needs a code, the context to understand its meaning. So, bart talks of this paradox of photography, constructed intentional meaning. Opinions or, you know, political maengs can see natural and pregiven things. This reminds me, thinking back to our photograph right here. Like we know there was a corpse hanging from a tree. Light reflects off that body on to a photographic film. That was there. That truth value, in some ways makes the constructed meaning seem natural and pregiven. So bart trying though i about this in terms of photography. So, you know, heres the photograph we referenced earlier. Heres another different shot taken by a spy plane. Same idea, cuban landscape. What did roland bart say about the publication of this image in the newspaper . That it has the captions on it. Its like take this warning in the photograph and makes it seem scarier which it means. Captions here tell us what to look for here. You know we see caption here identifies whats in here as well as these internal cappings. Tells us what were looking at. Kind of adding to that gives continue the text of like you said what were supposed to look for and kind of the photo on the left, sort of tell whats going on but in the context of a whole newspaper article you get more in depth what were supposed to be looking for and why this is a big deal and more background why people should be afraid of this photograph. More so like they are watching, for you to look for. How the text unloads this cultural and political ideas on to the photograph that isnt there when you first see it. That propaganda and corruption, what they want to you get out of that. Great. Exactly right. Great point. So this image says nothing, says very little, communicates very little to the reader but the caption, whether here, here, article over here, the political persuasion of the reader, as well as the va scientific looking quality of this photograph. It looks like a document. Looks like evidence. These all aspects lead us to think about the photograph and its meaning. It is very am b ambigous image. The fast majority of americans this was not communicating these ideas of missiles and so on. But also i want to talk too a little bit about how beyond bart, his analysis of photographs, images as they are published in newspapers. Material print production of these photographs also leads them to be even more ambiguous. We talked about the half tone. The half tone process we discussed many weeks ago around the turn of the 20th century, photographs can be converted to a screen of dots that can then be mass printed by newspapers. So dehe is my nation. Then the wire photo. The wire photo basically allows photographs to be transmitted via telephone or via a radio wire. So im going to briefly make this caption larger. Missile sight in cuba. A copy of a photo made public by the u. S. Embassy in london and radioed to the u. S. They first got access to this image. Its a long story. Thats basically the first time this graph emerged so they wired the photograph from london to new york to print it quickly in the next days paper. They had a new process for this. Just a reminder before the wire photo was introduced and well talk about its history in just a moment that photographs had to be literally transported from the site of their production to the newspaper. Remember the photograph, the earthquake in San Francisco in 1906 and it took four to five days to get the film from San Francisco to new york. So theres a significant delay in actually showing these images from San Francisco on the east coast. The film had to be put on a train to go all the way across the country. Of course the wire photo changes all of this. And it was invented back in 1907 as you see in this cover of Scientific American magazine. But not really made practical for widespread usage in the 1930s and didnt come in to common use until the 1940s. Really becomes entrenched in our national and International Press during the cold war in the 1950s and 1960s and up to the 1980s. Ill read the caption right here for this picture. This says a photograph of a german crown prince. You see it right here. Electrically transmitted to a distance of 1100 miles. The small picture is the actual result with a new method. The cover of Scientific American describes this me showed and you see the results here. We watch a short video. Short of short ecertain from a longer clip from a news reel available on youtube available from 1937. Gives a sense of how the wire photo works. So have a look. Although it took years to perfect the technique of send being pictures by wire is simple. Its not a matter of sending the whole picture at once but separating the picture into fine lines. Sending those lines over wire and assembling them at the other end. Lets suppose we have a picture or a pattern, which we want to send to another location. The only way to scene it is through a small tube. For our purpose well make this picture on closely wound string. Now if we start at one end of the picture taking it line by line or string by string in proper order we can run the string through the tube and assemble it at the other end. Thats exactly what we do in wired photo transmission. We now take the picture apart electrically and translate it into units we can send over the wire. The units are lined all the same width but different tones of gray. Long drawn lines. If youre interested, but we see here how it worked. This machine uses a lens, a light to break the photo down to lines of varying tonal levels and then notice the lines are transmitted over a phone line via electronic pulse. The ideas the lines, the total value of these lines are converted to a pulse and then that pulse is reconverted back to ideas of tonal values on the other side and newsroom and you have a photograph transferred over long distances and to be printed on the newspaper quickly. So think about this as you go from an image into a code. Sort of pulses on the telephone line and back into image. This brings back our diagram to remind us you got an image source and wire photo process right here. Of course denigrates the image. Ate good image. You can see whats in it. But its much more blurry than a crisp gelatin silver print that we saw in the dorothy lang exhibition. We have this ambiguity at the heart of the wire process. It becomes standard after world war ii and used until the 1980s. No longer in use today with digital technology. So important to how americans wowed International Audiences understood the cold war through photographs. Any questions about the wire photo process generally speaking . So to sum up this idea we have a blurry wire photo, blurry half tone, equals very blurry press imagery. Its important to remind ourselves these images taken as fact as to sort of conveying truth in history, were some of the boston ambigous images. The need for truth and for fact success undercut by this ambiguity of photography. And, again like the press context. We think about newspapers as conveying truth and fact represses or keeps down this ambiguity of the press photograph. So we take a quick detour and look at one painting. I want seems strange in a photography class. Andy warhol leads to our better understanding of the ambiguity of the wire froth. In 1962 he made this painting. Quite large. Eight or nine feet tall. Copying front page of the new york mirror of this plane crash. Whats interesting is that warhol is copying a wire photo. Warhol, thishappen stance. Look at the caption right here. He doesnt care about the narrative of the caption. Just this little part of the caption here. Delets most of the capping but gives us this. Upi radio the elephoto. Hes marking this is a the telephoto. It was upis branding of the wire photo process. So based on what we talked about with wire photos anticipate newspapers, what is one way to interpret what warhol is suggesting about the press photo here . Why paint it . [ inaudible ] the photograph is structured purposely and more intentional quality than a photograph. Revealing that aspect of press photography. Okay. Kind of going outside, takes away from some of the factual like inherent detonation. What else . Great. Thats spot on right. So the way warhol is calling attention to the be a straks of the ambiguity inherent in the press photograph by painting it by hand. We see whats going on here but still it renders it more ambiguous. In some ways we just saw this image right here, you might say plane wing. You would identify it as a plane wing but much more ambiguous. Headlines, 129 die jet tells us what we should look at. It encodes that photograph to tell us what it is were supposed to be seeing. So, again, bart turns that headlines codes the image. We talk a lot more about warhol. I wont. I will suggest war hall has interesting ideas about r press ambiguity and thats why he makes this painting right here. Lets switch gears a little bit and talk about ways in art museums and the most important and most famous exhibition of photographs ever has the same mechanisms of trying to control and fix meanings in photographs. This is the family of mann exhibition that opened at the museum of art in new york city in 1965. You see inflation shot right here of the entrance to the exhibition. Whats interesting for our purposes in this case thats cure jatd by stikend. Heres a flat iron photograph of 1907. Eventually he becomes curate or of photography at moma in 1947. He left his roots behind and becomes more democratic mass idea of photography. Theres some interesting stats to give us a sense of what its all about. As you see here it started at mona in 1965 and toured to 65 countries around the world. This is an exhibition of photography you can have multiple copies of the exhibition. You can have two or three opened at the simultaneously because they are photographs, you just make more copies. Toured to 69 countries. Included 503 photographs snapped by 273 different photographers from 68 different countries. So really provides a global understanding of the world through the medium of photography. And, you know, over all sort of iterations around the world had over 9 million visitors saw this exhibition and then the book itself which ill pass around a version of it in the class, you can sort of see the cat light here in itself sold 4 million copies. Still in print today. Go amazon can still buy a copy of the family mann. It still sells. Today i had you read some press releases that were put out about this exhibition. Get your sense what you thought about the press releases, whats important about the exhibition . How does it describe the show . Yeah, will . They emphasize how internationally this exhibition would be. I think it was signed by the photographers of the world to submit their photos to the exhibit to focus on how, you know, photos are from around the world. Like an international exhibition. International exhibition. Trying to get photographs from all over the world. Can somebody read this out loud for us . The family of maup is planned as an exhibition of photography returning universal elements of emotions and oneness of human becomes throughout the world. Most ambitious and challenging project that photography has ever faced in a one for which i believe tart of photography is uniquely qualified. We have photographs from around the world used to create an image of global unity. Its photography that can do this. And the second quote. Anyone read that one for us . Were concerned with photographs that express the soul through individual in particular. To demonstrate the importance of art of photography and explaining it across the world. It shows the forces of love and truth and coerciveness. We have a sense were talking about the expressing the universal in particular. He wants to find these images that suggest something about humans all together. In one single image. Then bring this all together to create some kind of global portrait what it means to be a human. The family of, family of humans. Family man in the 1950s. Also the way photography itself is a universal media. Anyone can understand a photograph. If youre someone that lives in australia and france, germany, japan, china, wherever you are, you can understand a photograph and it communicates universally the same torch. Of course this isnt necessary. This isnt true. Theres a utopian idea that photography does this. This is hard to see. This is the lay out of the exhibition. I want to call attention to some themes that he has, installations about. We have eating is one of the themes. All humans eat. All humans play. All humans drink. All humans not all but many humans have hard items and famine. Many are religious. Find these themes that apply to wide swath of the population. To prove were all human. We all have dinner together. Thats one of the points of the exhibition. And also the, you know, one scholar compared the exhibition to look like an oversized life magazine without advertisements. You have a lot of photo essays. Photographs of families hanging together right here. Oversized photo essay. And kind of interesting enough the photographs were from lifes own after skies. They went into the after divers and found photographs there that are in this exhibition so we have this connection between the exhibition and life. The do you know why he named it the family of man . Because back then people talked about humankind as mankind. It was this idea the whole world is one family. Global family. Were all the same. We all eat. We all drink. We all have families according to this exhibition. We do. We all eat, drink and have families of some kind. Trying to find that unity that links us all as human beings. Also i want to say too, we have no captions here. Theres some captions here and there. Each photograph is not captioned to tell us precisely what were looking at. It creates some blows some very large, sometimes crop images. Cuts out some images. Sees the photo editor of the family of man. And whats interesting too about having no captions is that these photographs were, going barts terms encode by images around them. Well show you examples of this in just a moment. Too, he had experience taking these large massive photographs, photograph exhibitions. In 1942, for instance he did ro road to victory talk about the american war effort. Pearl harbor was bombed in december of 1941. This exhibition designed to encourage patriotism and support the war effort. You can also see large photographs being hung in interesting environment as a way to create some kind of propaganda. So stikend had experience doing this. And because the exhibition, the insulation shots are hard to read the individual photographs i here have a spread in a catalog. Towards the end of the show, end of the catalog we have seven portraits that were featured. What are we looking at here . What links these photographs . Yeah, will. The theme of which appears to be portraits of couples. Yes. Portraits of couples and ill give you a little capping here to tell you where they are from. This one is from holland, china remember canada, american india, usa, germany, sicily, italy. Largely western european america. China here. China suggests that around the world there are heterosexual couples. We too from a multitude from roman poet suggests these two couples can become some kind of multitude and they have significance and they are important. So good. Thats what were looking at. The more important question is how . Why would he do this . Whats the broader significance of this . What are the implications of this . What are some ways to think about what hes suggests about humanity here . About difference . About different global regions. Sort of humanizes different cultures for people. Good. Humanizes these different cultures. Anyone else . Kind of equates them. Equates them. We have no idea who these people are. We dont know if these people were married or couples. They could be brother and sister. Work mates. Colleagues. We dont know who they are. But by putting these photographs all together, he is generalizing vast differences in identity, nationality and suggesting all these people are the same. They are all couples. Again, we dont know who these people are, what they are doing, if they are even heterosexual partnership. Whats interesting about the family man overall is the way each photograph in the show is controlled by those around it. So, again, think back to roland barts idea the photograph is an image about a code. Family man other images around the photograph encode image to make us see it in a certain way. It really is trying to control photographic meaning here and not allowing for the ambiguity of images. Question at this point about family man . And so again the culmination of images, of giant large photo essay is how stikend creates it. Understand too, of course, it originates in mona by stikend. Has a particular view of the world. Yes it suggests all the globe is linked through commonalities but still from an american perspective. The New York Times art critic kind of suggests a little bit its about politics. Lets read this out loud and lets think what cramer is projecting there. Under blanket ideology which takes for granted the essential goodness, and moral superiority of the international. Good. So what is cramer suggesting here. Almost just covers up all the issues you see around the world and with all these different areas because around this time it was at the end of the Second World War and beginning of korean war and vietnam war and whatnot so a lot of International Hatred youll see in this and it brings us as one big happy family. Americans idea of global unity but the world is in many ways fractured, deeply fractured by the cold war at the same moment. No real coincidence that towards the end of the exhibition theres some pictures here of people voting in different countries. Not a picture of americans voting but from some other countries and suggesting that voting, democracy is the natural human universal way of government. Of course democracy is much better than dictatorship. Im not arguing that. Presents this idea of americans has democracy as only universal form of government that maybe suggests its subtle ideological or political agenda of this exhibition. The larger point here is to suggest the family man does present an american centric view of the world. Its goal is again u the topian to show us how were all the same. Shows us this american view is universal as is the meaning of photography. Again, i really cant overestimate the importance of this exhibition. Artists saw this from around the world. These locales are contentious sites. Many east germans came over and saw the exhibition and had this political overtones. Guatemala city had a major coup in the 1950s where the cia intervened and over threw somebody they saw leaning towards communism. So its no accident these shows went to contentious political sites, even in moscow a little bit later. Maybe emphasizes or shows us the politics of the family of man. Any more questions of family man before i move on . Catalog is still circulating so have a look when it gets to you. One artist that is in the family man, at least from my estimation doesnt quite fit in to the show and heres his photograph from a page of people eating. Have a japan woman eating, drinking tea or having some sort of rice bowl something right here. Something about in the congo drinking out of the coconut. American photograph of someone, a group of patrons at a hamburger joint. Right here the caption, new york is taken by robert frank. For me this photograph is different. It suggests something through his composition. Let look at other photographs and have you do some of the work yourselves. For me i look at this photograph in the context of the family man and it seems a bit different as i said. Number one, the number one point of difference is frank is alluding outside of the frame. We have it cut in half showing the photograph should go on here and here. Theres a building next to the burger stand. So suggesting its just a selection of reality. Hes alluding to reality outside of the frame. Not suggesting its true. Just one version or one small slice of truth. Then we have robert frank is giving us this almost a photo within a photo, we discussed this numerous times this semester photographers have ideas of, through ideas of framing, looking at doors and windows to refer to the prohe se processes of photography itself. So we begin we look at these two aspects begin to show us how frank, somebody is allowing us to see a photograph as an intentional utterance. Show a certain view of reality, photograph it, then that very it touches that act and we see again his selection of this but also how the world continues around it. So frank alludes the photograph is one of many he chooses from others. And from this we go back to a, ask you we saw the exhibition upstairs of walker evans and the way walker evans used some of these ideas. A flat image with small images of a head shot. A window of a photo studio. We see how its constructed. So robert frank was really influenced by walker evans and we see franks interest in flatness as well as selfconscious, selfreflective ideas about photography. Trying to argue here that both evaps and frank are interested in showing us the selfconsciousness about photography. See how the photograph is come poesd. See it as an intentional utterance not as truth. Is that clear so far . This way robert frank works between the ideas of walker evans on one hand, sort of modernism but also a little bit of family man. Hes in the family man but also interested in ideas of photo journalism. So robert frank sort of described his practice the advertise very simply trying to make art photographs that look like press photographs or photographs inspired by popular photo journalism and you can see that, i think in this slide here. Some background on robert frank his biography is important to thinks world view and photography. He was born and raised in switzerland and lived out world war ii there as a young man. And as someone who grew up jewish in switzerland is petrified of the nazis attacking switzerland. Had this sort of dread from his young adult life and moved to the u. S. In 1947. He was a freelance photographer. He kept trying to get his pictures into life magazine. He got frustrated. As frank himself said quote i wanted to see my pick the tuesday in life magazine and they never buy them. I developed a tremendous contempt for them which helped me. Again he wanted to have that language of photo journalism that was published widely but more skeptical style didnt fit in with life magazines model of photo journalism. Hes an important figure in photography. Anybody after robert frank thinks about photo journalism or street photography and these sorts of things. Robert frank is vitally important. In some ways that photograph counters the optimism of the family man. Interesting undercutting that optimism of the family man. I should say, frank used a lika. Its not a lik amp its a okay none. You can shoot off like this or shoot over here. It allows for a very versatile understanding of photography and allows me to catch images on the fly. Imagine frank on the street capturing images, allows his versatility. This shows how he sort of thinks about capturing images. And in the mid50s he won a arg guggenheim scloip. Between 5 and 56 he took several short trips from new york and also took one long nine month Cross Country road trip. Driving. And brought his cameras and took many photographs around the country. And he shot over 20,000 pictures. So a massive amount of film he took. Produced contact sheets. Sent what he shot. Then he printed 1,000 of them to rather scale. Then he chose 83 of these to public lir in his book called the americans in 1958. You see it right here. 83 photographs. Kind of like american photographs you have an image on one side and very short caption to tell you where it was taken on the other side. Then think about the social message, the politics of this message. So the ideas of the formal qualities. Who wants to get us started. What is interesting about this photograph . Its pretty symmetric. There is the divide where it leads into two separate windows where it is a picture in and of itself. There is the bottom of the window and the lines go with that vertically as well. It is very symmetrical and one window here and one here and one divided down the window. It is symmetrical. I think the way it is divided into three segments it has that idea of a film strip. A film strip and we have two images but considered more broadly almost having two photographs in the photograph. Anyone else. I think it is interesting how you cant see their faces but the person on the right looks like hes been covered by the flag and on the left is more covered by the white i dont know what that is. This is a window shade i think. It is a persons face in shadows and covered by the flag. So i think the formal qualities is windows like separate photo frames. So we saw the hamburger picture, we have two portraits in the photograph. So again frank suggesting that his photograph is just a selection of these windows that could go on and on and on. And also as you sort of alluded to, we have ambiguity in the image. This womans face is obscured by the dark shadows of the room. Obscured of the window shade coming down against her. This flag is blocking this woman. And look at the title of the picture, it is called parade, hoboken, new jersey. So there is a patriotic parade going on outside of the window and these people are looking down at the parade and frank is looking at those watching the parade. And if a parade is a public exhibition, this public presentation of patriotism, of sort of ideas of whatever the holiday is. But it is very public and outward facing. Frank isnt interested in that sort of ideas about america. He wanted to find what is behind the facade. What is lurking in the shadows of america. But also doing so in a modernist selfconscious way. We saw walker evans photographing a brick wall, the two app ature, the two windows. And we know were looking at a photograph and again the sort of photograph within a photograph allude to sort of many other photographs that he could have taken but he sort of alludes to that in this picture. But the point again is the americans is trying to show us something that is sort of darker than the family man. Something that sort of shows us a darker underbelly to American Life in the 1950s. And as we talked about with walker evans, franks photographs are full of social intelligence, they tell so much about america in the mid 1950s flipping through the book but also his formal intelligence. Hes a photographers photographer. Artists love robert frank and his work. So the duality between the social and formal intelligence makes it such a important photographer for this class. And i want to mention, too, he experienced his own sort of dark side of america on his road trip. He was in arkansas the account goes in 1955 and had his camera out and taking photographs in arkansas. He was of swiss origin so his english was heavily accented. And so the police saw a man who seemed quote unquote foreign taking photographs in their town and they sort of detained him and put him in jail for a little bit and questioned him. To be a photographer, foreigner taking photographs in an American City in the mid50s, you could be a suspected communist, taking in to survey cities and trying to gain information or sort of plot some kind of infiltration. So robert frank himself was sort of detained by Arkansas Police for being a foreignborn photographer. So i think that is also sort of fuels part of his project. Were spending time on this image. I think if youre in the round table we had on tuesday, this photograph was mentioned but i want to look at it some more. This is the cover photograph of the americans called trolley new orleans from 55, 56. And the same type of thing. Talk about the formal quality and the social qualities. But before we do, i want to allude to the idea this is a really amazing photograph. And you look at franks film and it is a one shot. So hes photographing other things, other things, other things and then all of a sudden you turn around and captured the one image and it was this. Only one try for this image. And it is such an incredible image. So were reminded of henry bersans decisive moment, capturing this one perfectly balanced and composed image on the fly. So lets look at the social and narrative approach to image. What do we see here that suggests something about American Life in the 1950s . Anything we havent heard yet. The prevalence of segregation. And how do you see that in the image. It is quite split down the middle with the white people in the front and the black people sent to the back. There is a trolley in the american south, and the white customers, white passengers in the front and the africanamerican ones in the back. And how do you describe their expressions . What are some ways we can interpret body language and that sort of thing in this in these figures in the picture . I think im most struck by the woman in the second frame. Shes got a sour look on her face. Kind of like speaks to the image of a whole how they push africanamericans to the back which is distasteful. Hes looking out the window at frank registering his existence behind the camera and looking disdainfully at the camera. Other sort of views of body language, of sort of how the arms are going. Sort of ideas of the characters in this sort of drama . I think it is interesting the way the young boy is sort of wearing the posture in the frame and its odd because there is a suggestion that hes better than him but theyre [ inaudible ]. It is a great detail. The arms are mirrored right here and so in some ways there is comparative body language between the two. But of course the similarities end there in terms of social treatment. I think it is interesting that the children are in the center in the image because they are the ones that are not really playing a role in segregation. They are very innocent and whole. So the children here, so really young girl, young boy right here. And the idea that this is the future. They are children of the future. But the idea they are the future but are they on this side here, supporting fighting for the rights of those in the back. So children sort of the full crom of this image. I thought it was interesting the way hes positioned, where i think it is spaced, you wouldnt think that he was moving. He was sitting for the picture and sitting straightforward, not sitting on a bus. So it is kind of great. It all kind of especially the folks right here looking directly out at the photographer, not forward in the trolley and we have the window. So it seems like their individual photographs. And i think the fact that theyre all looking at the photographer shows they were aware the picture was being taken but probably so quick that they didnt have time to react, the fact theyre not smiling, makes it seem much more natural and truly capturing a moment in time. So it doesnt seem but looking at robert frank we have this natural quality to it. And i think the stern view of the woman here and the children here and this man almost looks desperate in a way that he is sort of thinking about his perhaps his plight in life to be a marginalized prejudice against africanamerican in new orleans. His face doesnt i think he looks oddly relaxed and that is sort of it is like hes just accepted his position. Another good read. Again shows the way that photography is very ambiguous, relaxed and the way his arm is resting outside of the window. But the gist of it here is that we see segregation. Literally. We see a picture of segregation in the act of this trial. And so frank documents that. And think about the family of man. This would not be involved in that exhibition. So any ideas of mistreatment or institutional racism will not be didnt have a part in he had card stiekens skexhibition. And lets reiterate some of the things weve said and go further. So what are the ways that frank composed this foetphoto formall it looks and references the flat picture plain that were looking at. So again flat. A lot of photographs get a sense of three dimensionalality and here is this flatness here. Jason. We talk about a picture within a picture. Each window it is like a small picture. Good. So each window said, the individual photo frame so we have this obscured part r por with the window closed and we have four pictures in this picture and it looks like a film strip. This is what film used to look like how 35 millimeter film looks. And i know we use digital cameras these days but then youre using film and it almost looks like a film strip. What about the reflections up here. What are some ways that we could think about tho about those, the reflections down here. Is your hand up again . I think it is a distorted reality which is interesting because the photograph is supposed to show the truth of something but it creates that ambiguity. Good. So another film strip up here and we have utter ambiguity. Almost abstract photographs. Suggesting a photograph doesnt have to be realistic or naturalistic, it creates some sense of abstraction as well. What about the idea of the reflection, too. What does that suggest about photography from robert frank. We see reflections that show us what is behind him. And i even had a student argue this i think right here you might see robert frank or maybe himself shooting the photograph. But the idea i think too is that we see that behind reflecting what is behind the camera. So robert frank is interested in the idea of not only what is in front of the camera but also what the camera is not shooting. So again the photograph is just one slice of a reality and robert frank alludes to through his photograph. So we see both the segregation of the 1950s in the south as well as the complete the constructed and incomplete nature of the medium of photography. So frank is showing us social reality but also a reminder this is not sort of the truth. Not the fact. But one fact out of many. So it is not really, again, about certainty, but hes suggesting meaning. Saying there is more than one meaning out there that one could select the photograph you want to take. So again to reiterate this one last time, that frank is working against that optimism of the family man. We see segregation and also see the photograph as a construction that is open to interpretation and open to manipulation. Does anyone have a question about robert frank before we move on to one last photograph. Yeah, lilly. If you were so against the family man, did he submit his photographs to be included in the exhibit or was he selected to be in the exhibit . Im pretty sure he submits his photographs. He provided permission to participate. But he wanted to be part of the mainstream discourse and doesnt want to compromise his values or integrity. So it is the classic wanting to be part of it but also dont want to be part of it sort of mentality. So i find itching about his work, hes definitely engaged with the family man and he knows it but the american certainly is rejecting it through its very language. Other questions . And so i mentioned earlier that frank was sort of inspired by or influenced by a photo journalism and i want to end by thinking about franks ideas of photography to cycle back into photo journalism and begin to have an effect on how the cold war kaz covered in the american press. And i quickly think about the vietnam war which is again something of an entire class. We could do a whole class on just the visual culture of the vietnam war. But i want to say briefly and generally that it did call questions of american certainty and exceptionalism into question. And ideas about who we are as a nation and what we value as a nation called into question by our involvement in vietnam. And of course globally people raise question about american morality and ethics in our treatment and sort of behavior in that war. And in the coverage of the vietnam war, especially in magazines like life magazine in the 60s youll see doubt and uncertainty in those used in the coverage of the vietnam war. And here is a wounded medic working on a soldier from 1966. This is a different sort of frame of it is right here on the cover of life. So how do we see these ideas here. How can it question idealism and certainty, what are ways to think about this wounded medic who works on a soldier . Margaret. I think it provides a stark contrast to the photos where you werent allowed to show any kind of american corpse or gore. Hes covering his eye and working on this dude we dont know if theyre still alive or not and just kind of laying there. So we have body and trauma and this medic injured himself working on had body. We see american soldiers in bodily trauma. I think without that caption or any kind of supplemental material you dont necessarily know what is going on in the photo. You just see this guy holding up maybe one of his comrades or a friend that got injured in battle. He wouldnt know hes trying to help him. Without the captions, it is hard to understand what is going on here. Yeah, will. And to add to his comments because well if we are looking at picture without a comments it would see soldiers helping another soldier but the comments capture saying that a wounded medic so were assuming that the guy was helping the other soldier is a medic and it is ironic that a medic is wounded as opposed to helping a wounded soldier. So the medic himself is wounded so it adds a ironic layer to the image and the idea of a blind medic. Imagine if you have an ambulance coming to your house and the medic is literally blindfolded. So something about the blind leading the blind. Here is an old peter broil picture from the blind leading the blind, a classic metaphor for irrationality, perhaps of the vietnam war. And as will mentioned, the irony is of a wounded medic. He was healthy and takes care of you and here we have a wounded medic. So my point is that even a photograph like this which is a press photograph, it begins to communicate some of the skepticism, some of the doubt. The national doubt creeping into sort of American Life in the 1960s. Through a photograph on the cover of life magazine. To sum up for today, i want to review the bigger points we talked about, to discuss how cold war photography, and the ambiguity in a photograph is respressed by the ideas and the need for political certainty and then they acknowledge the uncertainty and skepticism in the photographs with robert frank and ended by saying how the attitude becomes central to its turning tide in the war against vooelt and photographs like this show americans sort of gaining consciousness of what is going on and protests and sort of things that happen in the late 1960s. That is it for today. Well pick up on tuesday after this and talk about civil rights photography and have a great weekend and see you soon. Were featuring American History tv programs in prime time this week as a preview of what is available every weekend on cspan 3. Tonight well show you an academic tour of the big ten conference from our elects in history series with classes from perdue, rutgers, michigan and nebraska. University of maryland professoff Christopher Bonner leads off with a class about the concept of power in antebellum slave societies. American history tv, tonight at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan 3. American history tv products are now available at the new cspan online store. Go to cspanstore. Org to see what is new for American History tv and check out all of the cspan products. The Founding Fathers had competing visions for westward expansion. Duke University Professor Laura Edwards taught on a class on how the law changed many times in the early american republic, depending on who had the most influence. So public lands and the legal order. And were going to catch up just
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