Every Thursday, as part of my personal “enriched environment” initiative, I post a piece of art, usually from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which recently released online some 400,000 high-resolution images of its collection. All artwork will show a sun (or sunlight) somewhere.
I won’t name the piece or the artist, but instead invite you to study the art and post a comment addressing one or more of these questions:
- What is going on in this picture?
- What do you see that makes you say that?
- What more can you find?
If you have another idea, run with it.
Special Update! The New York Times website does this same exercise every Monday with a news photo that is uncaptioned and contains no text (click!). The Times asks viewers the same three questions:
- What is going on in this picture?
- What do you see that makes you say that?
- What more can you find?
However, at the end of the week, the Times posts the background information on the picture. So, I’ve decided to do the same. I’ll still post an unlabeled piece of art on Thursday. But return on Sunday (for the Sunny Sundays post!) and you’ll find an update on the artwork here.
Note: To embiggen the image, click on it!
Shadows, Paris
Artist: André Kertész (American (born Hungary), Budapest 1894–1985 New York)
Printer: Igor Bakht
Date: 1931, printed ca. 1978
Medium: Gelatin silver print
From Wikipedia:
André Kertész (French: [kɛʁtɛs]; 2 July 1894 – 28 September 1985), born Kertész Andor, was a Hungarian-born photographer known for his groundbreaking contributions to photographic composition and the photo essay. In the early years of his career, his then-unorthodox camera angles and style prevented his work from gaining wider recognition. Kertész never felt that he had gained the worldwide recognition he deserved. Today he is considered one of the seminal figures of photojournalism. The Estate of André Kertész is represented by Bruce Silverstein Gallery New York, NY
Expected by his family to work as a stockbroker, Kertész pursued photography independently as an autodidact, and his early work was published primarily in magazines, a major market in those years. This continued until much later in his life, when Kertész stopped accepting commissions. He served briefly in World War I and moved to Paris in 1925, then the artistic capital of the world, against the wishes of his family. In Paris he worked for France’s first illustrated magazine called VU. Involved with many young immigrant artists and the Dada movement, he achieved critical and commercial success.
Due to German persecution of the Jews and the threat of World War II, Kertész decided to emigrate to the United States in 1936, where he had to rebuild his reputation through commissioned work. In the 1940s and 1950s, he stopped working for magazines and began to achieve greater international success. His career is generally divided into four periods, based on where he was working and his work was most prominently known. They are called the Hungarian period, the French period, the American period and, toward the end of his life, the International period.
Four children. Overhead shot. Walking outside on a sidewalk. Sun’s on the right, children’s shadows stretch out to the left. Cobblestone street along lower border of the picture. Picture is black and white. There’s a bit of detritus on the sidewalk and in the gutter. The general impression is horizontal – the shadows, the curb, the orientation of the picture itself (extended landscape, not portrait). The question is: although the picture appears benign and sunny and heartwarming (four children walking), what is going on inside of their heads? Do the elongated shadows signify darkness of some kind inside the children themselves?
I notice the litter on the ground, and that the children’s shadows are “uplifting” because they rise up to the left; they aren’t completely horizontal.
Although, this raises a question. As the picture itself is stretched-out horizontal, does the Western eye, which reads the written word from left to right, start “reading” this picture on the left, then moving to the right? If that’s the case, then the shadows are starting high (where the heads are) and gradually lowering themselves to where the children’s actual bodies are. This implies a downward motion, and it relates to the comment above about how the picture appears benign and sunny but we can’t really know if there’s darkness in the children’s heads.
Now that i have typed this I think I may have over analyzed the whole thing. These comments are more reflections of MY mind than what is shown objectively in the picture itself.
I think the other commenters are over analyzing this. I’ve seen many photos like this, shot from above, people or animals having long shadows, the people or animals themselves merely blips on the page.
For me this photo is all concerned with composition and surprise.
Three of the children are wearing some kind of head gear.
I agree with the statement that it’s peculiar that their shadows are longer than the kids’ actual heights.
My question is, “How did the photographer get so overhead? Was the photo snapped by a drone?”