DAY 240

SOCIAL & POLITICAL COMMENTARY

Providing Life’s Essentials

LIVING WITHOUT

Poverty as a topic can present a host of issues for the photographer to work through. Paramount to this topic is deciding what poverty might “look” like. Dirty faces and an unkempt appearance is not enough to convey the social dilemma of poverty. The fact of living in a working-class neighborhood, riding a bus, or walking along a street filled with abandoned buildings does not convey poverty either.

In this photograph by Walker Evans, Bud Fields’ family is photographed in their home. What is revealed is a moment in time when this family finds themselves with the inability to satisfy very basic needs. Evans’ ability to take a photograph that depicts the rawness of a topic and does so in a direct manner is the result of the professionalism and deep understanding of the subject.

Gaining the trust of the family allowed Evans access into their home, a structure that provides inadequate shelter for any time of the year except the warmest of days. The lighting used by Evans, coupled with his linear approach to displaying the family as a whole, further shows a level of poverty not often seen in photographs. The filthy clothing the family wears jumps out as the viewer’s eye travels from one family member to the next, visually assimilating what Evans saw. —MLR