Re: Off-Topic, New Orleans Images

Gerry brings up a very interesting ethical point (I'm currently teaching
documentary and I will have to make a lecture on this next time I teach it).

I asked myself this question when I was doing large platinums and gums of
the damage for a Hurricane Series I am working on (which started from a trip
to Antigua a year ago). I actually had decided, before Gerry's post, to
donate any profit from the sales of those New Orleans prints to the victims.
The Antigua hurricane was 10 years ago and the owners of the damaged hotel
abandoned it, so frankly I don't owe them nothin'.

However, the ethical point of taking pictures of devastation and producing
them in an archival process is to have images that last a hundred years. I
much appreciate the history around the devastating San Francisco fire, and
am glad those images remain. I am not so sure our digital images will be
"archival" unless we continually are aware of migration issues, so I
"migrate" my images to alt.

But even more, I have now lectured with the New Orleans images 3 times and
raised awareness of how HUGE the devastation is, how it is not just New
Orleans, I have a list of facts and figures I share when i present, and I
read a great book--One Dead in the Attic--that I also talk about when I
present, so I do not think we are overly saturated with this disaster. When
Dan shared the "5x the size of Manhattan" fact, that went in my file, for
instance.

And, to be honest, all the expenses to make the trip were HUGE for me, and
it was my spring break to boot, so it was a financial sacrifice to go down
there. I have no news agency paying my way.

My husband thought I was nuts but after the trip was over, he agreed it was
the best, most educational "vacation" (NOT) we had ever been on. He
photographed with me all day, every day.

There is a history of documentary photographers profiting from their work,
or might I say being able to put food on the table because of their
documenting disaster and war and famine and the like. Some are probably
quite wealthy--Mary Ellen Mark, maybe? But IMHO the toll it takes on the
psyche to see this stuff is overwhelming and sacrificial. Mine was a drop in
the bucket--no starving children dying in front of me, with vultures waiting
above to pick the body. But i still cannot get the stench of one house I
walked into out of my nose...
Chris
Received on Tue Apr 25 08:57:51 2006