1. Unit 57: Photography and
Photographic Practice
Research of other
photographers work
CESCA HAIG
2. Mary-Ellen Mark
Mary Ellen Mark was born March 20, 1940 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
She is an American photographer known for her photojournalism, portraiture, and
advertising photography.
She first began photographing with a Box Brownie camera at age nine. she has
a BFA degree in painting and art history from the University of Pennsylvania in 1962, and
a Masters Degree in photojournalism from that university's Annenberg School for
Communication in 1964.
Her photography has addressed such social issues as homelessness, loneliness, drug
addiction, and prostitution. She works primarily in black and white.
Mark became a unit photographer on movie sets, shooting production stills for films
including Arthur Penn's Alice's Restaurant (1969), Mike Nichols' Catch-
22 (1970), Carnal Knowledge (1971) and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse
Now (1979) among her earliest.
Her photography has addressed such social issues as homelessness, loneliness,
drug addiction, and prostitution.
3.
4. This photograph was taken in December, 1987 when Mary Ellen Mark spent a week following a
homeless family for a photography project to be feature in LIFE accompanying an article wrote by
Anne Fadiman. The photo is of the oldest child in the family, Chrissy, aged 8. In this photograph you
can see that Chrissy is clearly upset by something, she is the main focal point of the image, behind
her is a window, not much can be seen outside of it. #The technique used to do this is called shallow
depth of field, this is when the foreground is not in focus but the more forward subject is in focus. The
exposure, how long light is allowed on subject before image is taken, is quite long as the image is
quite bright and you can clearly see the girls face. The composition of the image is quite good I think
because it shows the girl to the every front of the image and the background is showing the outside
which is not bright. Rule of thirds is another technique used in this image. #
The picture is in black and white, I think that this makes anyone who is looking at this photograph
look more closely at the features of the girls face, they are not distracted by anything else.
5. Mary Ellen Mark is a portrait photographer, she mainly
works in black and white, using classic Kodak Tri-X film.
6. I like this photograph by Mary Ellen Mark because of how it shocks the viewer, it is of a young girl
named Amanda and her cousin Amy. Amanda is the girl stood up in the paddling pool, she is only nine
years old yet she is smoking and mimicking actions of someone much older than herself.
This image is in black and white, I think this is effective because a viewer isn’t distracted by anything in
the background as it is all quite plain and dull, whereas the two girls and the pool are much lighter,
drawing your eyes to them.
I think that images like this make a viewer want to find out more about the subjects and who they are.
Something that I would like to happen with my photography.
# From the looks of this image the exposure, amount of time light is allowed to hit and object before you
take the picture, is quite long as the image is quite light on the two girls and you can clearly see what
the main subject should be. The composition of this image is done quite well as Amanda, the girl at the
front, is quite clearly made to be the main subject as she is brought more forward than the other girl is.
Another technique used is shallow depth of field, this is when the subject at the front is more in focus
than the one at the back.
7. I think Mary Ellen Mark is good with her photography because she connects them all up, She
photographs different people over a few years. These are a set of pictures of a called girl
known as ‘Tiny’ Mary Ellen Mark met Tiny when she was just 13 and has gone back to
photograph her throughout her whole life. Mark has offered to help her out over the years
and has done the same with a few of her other subjects that she has photographed.
I think the relationships that she develops with her subjects help her with her ability to
capture peoples emotions, because they know her and are honest with her about what is
going on with their lives, this makes the images stand out more and means that people who
view the images can get a real understanding of the people in the images.
As she photographs people throughout their lives, anyone who follows her photography can
see them and how they change throughout the years. She uses a long exposure and depth
of field to get her images to come across the way she does.
