I saw that the camera could be a weapon against poverty, against racism, against all sorts of social wrongs. I knew at that point I had to have a camera. Gordon Parks
When I was looking for a photographer to choose, I wanted to pick someone whose photography helped enact social change. In high school, I saw how photographers such as Dorothea Lange and Lewis Hine documented the poor living and working conditions in some facets of American life, so I quickly gravitated towards Gordon Parks in my search because of his work on African American lives in New York.
Gordon Parks took American Gothic in 1942 after witnessing an overwhelming amount of bigotry while working under the Farm Security Administration in Washington DC. The person in the photo is Ella Watson, a janitor at the FSA. She had to raise a family of four on an annual salary of $1,080 ($15,000 by today’s standards), while a white woman worked a better job in the FSA even though both had similar qualifications and applied at similar times. Parks was horrified by the discrimination he saw in the federal organization that he worked in and submitted his photo to his boss, where it eventually appeared on the front page of the Washington post as an “indictment of America”.
The first thing that I see in this photo is Watson holding a broom and mop in the center. It is clear that she is not satisfied with how she has been treated and believes that she deserves more out of life. The broom and mop represent all types of menial jobs, and Parks uses them in this photo to imply that African Americans in the U.S. have to settle for low level jobs as a result of the discrimination that they face. This applies to New York in particular because as an urban, densely populated, and industrialized city, low-level jobs such as cleaning are a lot more common.
The flag in the background is also important to point out as it represents America as a country and in a way acts as a setting for this photo. Because of this, I think that Parks is blaming America for the discrimination and the segregation that African Americans had to go through in the 19th and 20th centuries. One important thing to note about the flag is that the stars are arranged in identical rows, which is different from the traditional cascading pattern. This incongruence may symbolize the “twisted America” that African Americans have to go through, one that is not brought to life nearly enough as “America, land of the free”. This duality also applies to New York as even though it has been seen as a place of refuge and freedom throughout history, it still employs discriminatory practices that are hidden by its grand industrial and social progress.
One of the photographic techniques that Parks uses in this photo is shooting in black and white, which gives the photo a gloomy connotation, fitting for the commentary on America that Parks was aiming for. Parks also heavily focuses on Watson in this figure to the point where even the fibers of her broom are distinguishable. Parks probably did this intentionally, as the rest of the photo is blurry and most of the objects, the flag included, in the background are cut off. Another technique that he uses is leaving empty space directly around Watson, which indirectly adds more focus to the middle of the photo.
This photo was named after Grant Wood’s iconic painting, and naturally has some elements in common. Wood’s painting contains farmers instead of cleaning workers, which is fitting for the different era as farming was seen as a low-level job in the 19th century. However, the husband and wife in Wood’s American Gothic seem much more well off than Watson in this photograph, as the couple have a house in the background to live under. By using the same name for his photograph, Parks was perhaps trying to outline different standards of living among different races, as the couple in Wood’s American Gothic is white while Watson here is black.
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New York City is lauded as one of the most culturally diverse and progressive cities in the world, which makes it easy for me to forget the people who suffer from discrimination. I don’t experience much discrimination on a day-to-day basis, but American Gothic reminds me that some people have to live with such a burden, possibly undeservedly. Even though the city is constantly evolving and improving through technological progress, I should remember that these advantages aren’t spread equally among different groups of people, with some not receiving any benefit at all.
On a similar note, this photo urges me to take advantage of the opportunities that I have right now while I am still living in this city. I haven’t explored much outside of outings for my high school classes such as visiting the Irish Hunger Memorial and the shows in this Arts in NYC Seminar. I definitely enjoyed seeing shows such as Syncing Ink and Tiny Beautiful Things because they conveyed themes such as identity and loss that a lot of people can relate to on some level. Even though the other performances such as Café Muller and La Boheme didn’t speak to me as much, I still learned about the intricacies and detail that go into ballet, opera, and musical performances. If I have time in the future, I will definitely try to visit some of the hundreds of cultural institutions that New York City has to offer so I can make the most of my time here.
Works Cited
“Gordon Parks” Gordon Parks Foundation, <http://www.gordonparksfoundation.org/artist>. Retrieved 26 Nov. 2017. (biographical information)
“The Invisible Man” The Culture Trip. <https://cdn.theculturetrip.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/the-invisible-man-harlem-new-york-1952-c-gordon-parks-courtesy-the-gordon-parks-foundation-1.jpg>. Retrieved 26 Nov. 2017. (photo file, unused)
“American Gothic” <https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*Hqzn-DeGAVXJtf1Vxje-og.png>. Retrieved 26. Nov 2017. (Gordon Parks photo file)
“American Gothic – Frank Wood” Wikipedia. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Gothic>. Retrieved 28 Nov. 2017. (Frank Wood photo file)
