The Street photographs, Shirley Baker

Shirley Baker ( 1932-2014) was a British photographer who was known for photographing the post- war, working class people of inner city areas. She was intrigued with photographing the places that most ordinary people easily overlooked. This photo found in an e-portfolio titled The Street photographs pictures just the topic that intrigued her and thus came on to intrigue me. Initially, you see here children who are playing jump rope with an adult, possibly one of their relatives. The children and the older man all look extremely happy as if that moment in their life was just the happiest they ever experienced. The older man is delightfully watching the girl in the middle jumping rope while the girl on the end turning the rope, the girl jumping in the middle, and the girl who is holding the mans hand are all looking at the camera and thus at us, at the viewers. That is the studium, the children are happy they are doing something outside that makes them happy, something they like to do, something that in the intrigue of the photographer is easily overlooked. No one, looking in from the side will think so deeply about children jumping rope however, the photographer captures that particular moment, in the action of jumping rope, that shows that such a simple and easily overlooked activity makes these children so happy especially during a time and place that isn’t so happy. However, that only covers the general interest. Here, personally the punctum is the two children in the back who seem to be walking. They are on the same side of the sidewalk as the children jumping rope but they are farther down the sidewalk, fairly close to the street. These children seem to be headlining for the street yet they are unattended, they seem to have no one watching them while they are outside, much less walking towards the street. It seems like every child in this picture has an adult that is supervising them except for those two children in the back. There is nothing to indicate that children should or can be going outside without supervision. It sparks thought about their stories and their lives because, we in this time period are not used to seeing unsupervised children. So, there is definitely thought of what could be different about them and what is there need to be outside, and since they are outside why are they outside together but not being watched, is there trust that because they are together they don’t need to be supervised, what is going on beyond this frame that we don’t know about?  Also, they seem like they’re boys and the rest of the children in the picture look like girls, so it could be entirely possible that because they are boys they don’t need to be supervised. Whichever the explanation is for this, it explains the intrigue of the photographer because to us now, seeing unsupervised children is uncommon but, here it seems to be just another aspect that is easily overlooked.