Response to Berenice Abbott

This article by Berenice Abbott was especially interesting because of its prevailing message. First published in 1951, Abbott argues for photography’s return to the documentary. “I believe there is no more creative medium than photography to recreate the living world of our time. Photography gladly accepts the challenge because it is at home and in its element: namely, realism – real life – the now.” She denounces the amateurism and lowliness of the construction of sets, backdrops, retouching, and intensive post-process work in the darkroom. I feel the same argument exists today, and even moreso – if only Abbott knew the extent to which photography distanced itself from “the real” in contemporary settings. Abbott feels as though the beauty of reality is overlooked, advocating for “a return, on a mounting spiral of historic understanding, to the great tradition of realism.” She writes that images have the ability to make statements and “document the now,” and image-makers possess the responsibility to make those statements truthfully. For the most part, I agree that photography should make a return to less edited and enhanced products. In some cases, I feel that editing isn’t the complete worst thing that can happen to a photo. Photos of friends, family, and events – personal images – I feel exist to stimulate nostalgia and happy thoughts and emotions, and any editing that can enhance that feeling doesn’t detract from the reality of the image, it only adds to the purpose of its existence. In other words, the image doesn’t exist to depict the physical truth in the first place; it exists to depict the emotional truth. However, there are many situations in which these augmented images are damaging to the intended audience and mostly because the audience is composed of a far greater number of people; for instance, advertisements depicting heavily airbrushed and edited bodies and physical appearances directed toward children and adolescents, especially young girls whom are particularly susceptible to the influence of beauty standards. Another example is the deliberate editing of images that are meant to stand as historical documents: photos of post-war aftermath, tragedies and disasters, political events, et cetera. I believe that since these types of images represent a collective truth, on a societal level, then it should be as accurate as possible. Conclusively, I agree mostly with Abbott’s argument that photography needs to make a return to the real, but only for certain images, images for the people. Images for ourselves, however, can be whatever they need to be.