Photography and Race (books)

Identity
Identify, establish identity of; associate (oneself with); treat as identical. Identification, Identity, absolute sameness, individuality, personality.
The everyman English dictionary, DC Browning, 1990.

Race
Descendants of common ancestor; distinct variety, breed: noble birth; peculiar flavour; natural disposition. Suicide; diminution of population by restriction of birth rate.
The everyman English dictionary, DC Browning, 1990.

“The Ugandan child’s hand, in contrast with that of the missionary, looks like the claw of an emaciated bird or something found in an archaeological site.”

This image is by a photographer called Michael Wells he is based in Ilfracombe in North Devon. He used to work as a royal butler before entering a profession in photography. His style is very relaxing and calm.

In this image Wells has managed to capture the difference in race. when I first saw this image I immediately thought of race in history, with white people being more wealthy and black people being poor and used as slaves. And it seems that things are not much different these days there is still no equality people are still living in bad conditions.

The difference in race means this poor African person lives a poor and starving life and the white person a healthy looking person. there is no need for faces in this imge the hands say it all you tell a lot about people from their hands usually something like a profession, but this image shows us a much bigger picture, from the image of just a hand you can see this person is malnutritioned and poor.

I like this style of photography it keeps the image calm, had the photographer used their faces in this image it may have reached out to the audiences emotions which Wells may not have wanted them to connnect with as an audience.

The Photography Book. Phaidon 1997.