Tiffany Lee: Participant vs. Professional Photography
October 26, 2011
In a unique class, Visual Communication and Social Change, 4th-year students explore and contrast the images of professional and “participant” photographers; try to discern the impact of various forms of visual media on its target audiences; and read authors who promote participant-photography and those who are critical of it, as they attempt to answer questions such as, “Do media professionals distort the stories of the poor and dispossessed? Can participant-photography make a meaningful impact given the amateur photographer’s lack of training and experience?” Read their initial analyses and join the conversation.
Participant vs. Professional Photography by Tiffany Lee
Participatory photography and professional photography are two very different ways that people can capture what they interpret is reality onto photographs. What ultimately sets the two apart are the photographers’ motives and goals behind their photographs. Professional photographers take a picture with the ultimate goal of evoking a response from his viewers. Whether it is taking a photograph to make an artistic statement, taking a photograph of a significant event to give the viewer visual information on a subject, or simply taking a photo of a crying baby to evoke the emotion of sadness in its viewers; the drive of the professional photographer is always the viewer. This is different in participatory photography because these photographers don’t necessarily have concrete motives for shooting certain subjects. Often, participatory photographers are people that are disadvantaged as a result of social problems; photographs that they take of their daily lives are often used to shed light on these particular issues to the general audience. However, just because advocating is what participatory photography is often used for, this doesn’t necessarily mean that participatory photographers shoot their picture with such intent. What they are really doing is merely sharing to the public what their life is like; taking pictures of their friends, their family, and their home is not so much a political statement as it is just shooting pictures of how they live their life. Viewers are the ones who ultimately attach another meaning to these photographs because they look at the exposed social issues through their own political and ideological lens. The juxtaposition between professional and participatory photographers can be seen in photo projects such as Shooting Back. Participating children were given cameras to take pictures of their daily lives in poverty, as a result they took pictures of them on the school bus, at the playground or eating with their family; in other words, pictures that we, the viewers, would take of our daily lives as well. Later, when the professional photographer (Hubbard) who was involved collected these photos and made them part of the project, he changes the meaning of the photos from being family photos that children have shared, into photos that viewers see with ideological lens towards the social issue that is being exposed. This example shows how often time, participatory photography will have the motive to share, while professional photography shoot with its viewers in mind.
Written by Admin · Filed Under For Students
I completely agree that the viewer determines photographic meaning. I hadn’t considered that the professional photographer’s image is always captured with the viewer or market in mind. You’re so right; when a professional is shooting, he or she is looking through the lens with a very distinct goal to capture something provocative or marketable. Citizen photographers are definitely creating images with a different goal. I agree with your idea that their intent is less biased in that they are shooting their lives.There is something about citizen photography that feels more honest. I suppose it’s most important that we recognize that juxtaposition you identified as we study images.