Writing Station – Dorothea Lange Photos

1. Read Dorothea Lange’s Biography and discuss main points.

2. Analyze and discuss 3 different photos

individually using the questions on the list.

3. Choose one photo and write a journal making pretend you are one of the subjects (people). Think about all you know about the Great Depression and include details concerning the life of the subject. OR Write a poem reflecting details about the photo.

"Bring the viewer to your side, include him in your thought. He is not a bystander. You have the power to increase his perceptions and conceptions."

Dorothea Lange

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/dorothea-lange/watch-full-film-dorothea-lange-grab-a-hunk-of-lightning/3260/

DOROTHEA LANGE SYNOPSIS Dorothea Lange's images of Depression-era America made her one of the most acclaimed documentary photographers of the twentieth century. She is remembered above all for revealing the plight of sharecroppers, displaced farmers and migrant workers in the 1930s, and her portrait of Florence Owens Thompson, Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California (1936), has become an icon of the period. Since much of this work was carried out for a government body, the Farm Security Administration, it has been an unusual test case of American art being commissioned explicitly to drive government policy. After the Depression she went on to enjoy an illustrious career in photo-journalism during its hey-day, working for leading magazines such as Fortune and Life, and traveling widely throughout Asia, Latin America, and Egypt. She was instrumental in assembling the "Family of Man" exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1959, a renowned celebration of struggling post-war humanity.

DOROTHEA LANGE KEY IDEAS Many of Lange's documentary photographs borrow techniques from the lexicon of modernism - dramatic angles and dynamic compositions - to produce startling and often jarring images of her subjects. They never overpower the subjects themselves, but instead subtly direct the viewer to a fresh appreciation of the individual's plight. Lange's mature work proved that works of art and documents are not mutually exclusive, and that they can combine to produce beautiful, moving, and campaigning images. Her use of innovative techniques also proved that modernist art need not only convey the private feelings of the artist, but could also be put in the services of popular journalism. Lange's work, not only in the Depression but also in the post-war years, is characteristic of a lost age when a broad swath of the mass media was profoundly concerned with social issues. She saw herself firstly as a journalist and secondly as an artist, and she worked with a burning desire to effect social change by informing the public of suffering far away. Article from: http://www.theartstory.org/artist-lange-dorothea.htm

Dorothea Lange’s Photos - Discuss for at least 3 photos.

1. What impression or feelings do you get from the photo?

2. List observable details from the photo (color, things, people, objects, etc.).

3. Is there a theme or deeper message?

4. What can you infer?

5. What questions do you still have?

Migrant Mother 1936

Sharecroppers

White Angel Bread Line, San Francisco 1933

Little Money: Waiting for the semimonthly relief checks at Calipatria, Imperial Valley, California. Typical story: fifteen years ago they owned farms in Oklahoma. Lost them through foreclosure when cotton prices fell after the war. Became tenants and sharecroppers. With the drought and dust they came West, 1934-1937. Never before left the county where they were born. Now although in California over a year they haven't been continuously resident in any single county long enough to become a legal resident. Reason: migratory agricultural laborers.

Children of Oklahoma drought refugee in migratory camp in California.

Damaged Child, Shacktown, Elm Grove, Oklahoma 1936

Mended Stockings, Stenographer, San Francisco, 1934

Dust Bowl Refugees 1936