taken by Helen Levitt
When listening to the commentaries on the museum’s website, the above picture captured my attention almost immediately. I didn’t learn much about it from the commentary however, as the curator chose to speak of other photographs and techniques of Levitt’s and such. After doing a little research of my own, I found an article in the Times about Ms. Levitt, which featured that photograph and gave it this caption, “A 1939 image of trick-or-treaters by Ms. Levitt was part of the inaugural exhibition of the Museum of Modern Art’s photography department in 1940.” When I was in the exhibit itself I don’t remember seeing this photograph in particular of Levitt’s, though it is possible I could have simply overlooked it, but nevertheless, it made enough of an impression to make me want to comment on it.
From what I’ve seen from my little research stint that particular photograph did not have a name. I’m not sure if that’s a common thing in photography, being more interested in paintings myself. This is a detail that makes me dislike photography more than other art forms—the lack of a name gives me the feeling that it is impersonal, mechanical and cold.
What really struck me and made me remember this photograph in particular was that it featured young children. Normally in art, I expect to see adults, or landscapes, religious scenes, or scenes from mythology and so on. That is why the description of Levitt, “She became intrigued by the chalk drawings children would make on the streets…” made me sit up and take notice. Are not most formal portraits done at the behest of someone other? How many portraits are done at the insistence of the artist rather than at the insistence (and payment) of a patron? Depictions of children in art always seemed to be more innocent in that sense. The child likely does not care about having a painting of himself, making it more about the art and less about the demand of a commission. Adding to this is the fact that the photo was taken candidly, as many of Levitt’s photographs were. Here was an artist, I thought to myself, who worked not for commission or payment, but for whatever kept her interest.
“Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman” by Bernice Abbott caught my attention and forced my consideration as I walked through the exhibit, even despite my initial intention to simply go in and take a brief look at the ones I had already decided I wanted to write about. I admit that I was only giving the exhibit a cursory walk-through at first, so that my eyes seemingly slid over this photograph the first time, dismissing it.
What made me pause first was its caption, which reminded me of the similarly titled book by Joyce that I’ve been meaning to read. Looking at it again, or rather, for the first time with all of my attention on it, I thought that the use of distortion was really very clever for a self-portrait, particularly one of a young woman, because of the symbolism and depth it added.
To me, photography, while having the potential to be aesthetically pleasing or perhaps well executed, always seemed like a shallow venture. Where was the hidden message? Where was the emotion of the photographer? How could he pretend to create meaning in such a mechanical art form? In my personal opinion, the event photographed could be powerful or moving, but to say that the photograph itself is moving would be an overstatement.
Anyone could take a picture of any given event, person, or place. There isn’t anything special about something that can be duplicated, or produced by a different person behind the same camera at the same time and place. Arguing about the skill of the photographer involved, or the work put into developing, and the element of luck in capturing the perfect photo seems to me like arguing semantics. A photograph couldn’t possibly be as layered and plied with meaning as a painting—or so I thought.
I believe that this photograph represents the feeling of distortion present in one’s own body image, and the malleability and subjectivity of one’s looks, which in turn represents a depth that I have never really encountered in photography before, one that causes me to reevaluate my skepticism of the versatility and spirit of originality of the medium.
