Dorothea Lange

by Mark Durden

Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) is one of the most famous documentary photographers of all time. In 1935, tired of studio portraiture, she began working for the Farm Security Administration and created many of the images that define the Depression in the popular imagination. Other artists in this series Eugene Atget, Mathew Brady, Wynn Bullock, Julia Margaret Cameron, Joan Fontcuberta, David Goldblatt, Nan Goldin, Graciela Iturbide, Andre Kertesz, Mary Ellen Mark, Joel Meyerowitz, Boris Mikhailov, Lisette Model, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Eadweard Muybridge, Eugene Richards, W. Eugene Smith, Shomei Tomatsu, Joel-Peter Witkin

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction, History

128 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

Reviews

[Sven · Rating 4 out of 5]

De wereld is veel veranderd sinds het uitkomen van AI. Nu moet men zich telkenmale de vraag stellen of iets echt is of gegenereerd geweest is. Vooral in fotografie begint dit moeilijk te worden. Sommige beelden zien er echt uit maar zijn het niet wat dan natuurlijk weer het omgekeerde opwekt als iemand een speciaal beeld geschoten heeft dat men denkt dat het AI is. Denk daarbij maar aan de foto van de Olympische spelen met de surfer die boven het water zweeft met zijn surfbord evenwijdig met zijn lichaam. Velen dachten AI maar niets was minder waar. Waar wil ik naartoe met deze uitleg? Niet om jullie in slaap te laten vallen maar wel om mijn laatste gelezen boekje in beeld te brengen.

Dorothea Lange door Mark Durden

Het fotoboekje dat ik gelezen of bekeken heb is er eentje uit de reeks 55. Een reeks boekjes dat uitgebracht werd begin de jaren 2000. Pocket boekjes om de prijs laag te houden. Want zeg nu zelf, niet iedereen kan 60a70 euro neertellen voor een fotoboek. Ik heb dit boekje niet gekocht maar in de bib geleend.

Dorothea Lange, een zeer gekende fotografe, die het vroeger moest stellen zonder AI. Een documentaire fotografe, wat dan weer een tak is in de fotografie dat mijn aandacht zeker kan pakken.
Lange is een dochter van Duitse migranten die in 1895 in Hoboken, New Jersey, beland waren. Op de leeftijd van 7 j kreeg ze polio. Ze startte haar fotografie carriëre als portretfotografe maar schakelde dan meer en meer over op reportage fotografie.
Ze is vooral gekend om haar werk rond migranten. Het in beeld brengen van deze mensen met de focus op hun lichaamstaal. De vrouwen komen veelvuldig naar voren als het sterkere deel van het gezin.

De teksten zijn zeer duidelijk en de foto’s zijn, ondanks het pocket formaat, toch mooi en duidelijk afgedrukt.
Tekst en foto’s samen brengen de lezer een volledig beeld van het fotografische leven van Dorothea Lange die aan kanker stierf in 1965.

[Judith Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

My son bought me this for my birthday, along with a Studs Terkel book Hard Times and a Langston Hughes spoken word CD. He buys great presents!

Two things:
Firstly, it's great to look at photos, beautifully printed on very high quality paper, in a book, rather on the screen.

Secondly, it is striking that the migrants suffering in these pictures, decried for being lazy and feckless, but actually desperate to work and struggling to care for their families, are not from countries outside the US, but economic casualties of mechanisation and of the greed of the 'big men' who monopolised the best land at the time of the Great Depression ...

[Jeannie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A short introspective on the life and works of Lange. I enjoyed the commentary of the many different images she took and the focus of her endeavors.

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautiful little book that has many of Lange’s classic photos from the Great Depression, as well as a few that she took of Japanese-Americans being sent away to internment camps during WWII. This would serve well as a quick introduction for people who perhaps are familiar with her most famous photo (Migrant Mother), but may be less familiar with her other works. You could use this book as a stepping stone of sorts: its compact size is handy, but to really get the full effect of her photos I think a bigger format is preferable. Still, you can’t go wrong with any collection of Lange’s photos… they’re powerful no matter what size they’re printed.

[Cindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always loved that famous photo of Lange's, Migrant Mother. And I love the artist Maynard Dixon. I didn't realize that the two artists were married. According to the book, he expressed envy at how well Lange captured the essence of the Forgotten Man. He then turned to capturing the same subject in his painting, but her photographs seem to be the more familiar of the images. Many of her most famous pictures are from the Depression era, but this book also contains some of her pictures of the Japanese interment camps as well. Amazing and powerful stuff.

[Charity · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don’t think there will ever live another photographer who was able to do what she did. The desperation she was able to catch on peoples faces, whether they were starving migrant workers or Japanese Americans being led to internment camps, is just something I have not seen another photographer capture as soulfully.

[Dolina · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book contains a short biography and 55 of Lange's photographs with explanatory material on each. Lange saw photography as a tool for political action, and she saw both dignity and despair in her images of migrants from the Dust Bowl and Depression era homeless camps. The irony and social commentary in her photographs made her such a brilliant photographer. This is a moving
book of images.

[TrumanCoyote · Rating 3 out of 5]

The pics were good, and it was interesting to read Lange's comments (whenever they were included). As usual though with this stuff, you should avoid at all costs the rest of the text, which was a lot of artsy, sentimental (not to mention hypocritical) hooey about "dignity" and suchlike crap. At any rate, there's something about all this that kinda rubs me the wrong way; I mean, if Lange really had "identified" with her subjects all that much, I've got the feeling that she would've tossed her camera posthaste and joined them on the picket line. ;)

[Cliff Watt · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this book after reading Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath as Lange famously documented the migrant workers during the 30s.

The photographs are well printed but at less than A5 size, the book is far too small to do the images justice. I should have gone straight for An American Exodus.

[Carlos Miguel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dorothea Lange is a hero. Her photographs transmit so many issues in her time that are even more relevant in our times. Her photos are timeless. Short book, but on point. Tells her perspective and makes you think all her messages through her beautiful pictures. Inspiring.

[Elisha Neethling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful and powerful images.

[CURTIS NUGENT · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good monograph. As a student of Lange I have seen most of these photos before. Good to read a new perspective on her work.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Classic iconic photos and biographic overview of an 20th century American photographer.