The document discusses the history and meaning of documentary photography. It traces the genre back to its roots in providing objective evidence and truthful accounts through photographs. Examples are given of early documentary photographers like Jacob Riis, Lewis Hine, Margaret Bourke-White, and Dorothea Lange who captured images showing social conditions and hardship in America. Their photographs provided visual evidence and raised awareness of important social issues.

1. Documentary 1

2. “ That’s a sophisticated, misleading word,and not really clear” (Interview with Walker Evans, Art in America , Leslie Katz. 1971)

3. Document means evidence. It comes from the medieval term documentum which was a term for an official paper. This would contain evidence that could not be questioned, a truthful account backed by the authority of law.

4. As a genre in photography it is associated with the same significance and authority. ‘ The Great Chartists Meeting on Kennington Common’, William Edward Kilburn. 1848. The historical significance invested a photograph’s status as a truthful and objective representation of what had happened.

5. Photograph of Jacob Riis in The Making of an American . 1904 Jacob Riis Bandit’s Roost February 12 th 1888

6. Gangs of New York Martin Scorsese, 2002.

7. Jacob Riis, Five Cents Lodging, Bayard Street , c. 1889

8. Jacob Riis, Peddler. 1890

9. Lewis Hine Poor home. New York City tenement Lewis Hine, Woman washing clothes . 1909-12 Lewis Hine

10. Lewis Hine, Doffer Girl in New England Mill. 1909

11. Margaret Bourke-White Sharecropper’s Home. 1937 Farm Security Association. Roy Stryker

12. Dorothea Lange. Dorothea Lange Migrant Mother. 1936

14. “ When Dorothea took that picture, that was the ultimate. She never surpassed it. To me it was the picture of Farm Security. She has all the suffering of mankind in her, but all the perseverance too. A restraint and a strange courage.” Roy Stryker