“New York, 1958” BY Vivian Maier

“New York, 1958” by Vivian Maier

Anxo, Sergio and Sabela- 3ºA English Project Photography Project 3​rd​ Term - IES Fene

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Table of contents 1) Introduction ................................................................3 2) Photo analysis “New York, 1958” by Vivian Maier ....3 a) Observation skills………………………………..3 i) Theme……………………………………….3 ii) Action……………..…………………………3 iii) Characters…………….………………......4 iv) The story behind the photo….……...…..4 b) Technical Knowledge…………..………...…...5 i) Photographer’s point of view ….…….....5 ii) Lighting…………………………………….5 iii) Framing & Cropping……………………...5 3) Vivian Maier’s biography……………………………6 4) The real story behind the photo…………………...6 5) Conclusion………………………………….………..7 6) Bibliography………………………………………….8

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1) Introduction In this project we are going to analyze this photo because we think that racism and child work are very important problems nowadays and people think more about these problems because a lot of people are suffering because of them and we want to stop with it.

2) Photo analysis a) Observation skills i) Theme: The theme is about ​racism and child work. It is an old photo because the children are wearing old clothes.

We think that this photo could have been taken in America because the streets are different from European.

ii) Action: In the foreground we can see a black child cleaning the white child’s shoes and in the background we can see a white child cleaning the white boy´shoes and the shop window.

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The photo was taken in 1950 because it is in black and white and people clothes are very old. The place looks like a city in USA because the streets are similar to a city like New York.

iii) Characters: The white boy is very happy but the black boy is sad and worried. the black boy is cleaning the white child’s shoes while the white boy is sitting on a chair.

The boys are about twelve years old. The white boy is American and the black one is probably African.

iv) The story behind the photo: We think that the black boy is an immigrant that doesn’t have any money and he is earning his living, and the white is a rich american child. One day the white child and his father went to the city to buy some food and clothes and they saw two boys working as shoe cleaners and they decided to go and clean their shoes.

b) Technical Knowledge 4

i) Photographer’s point of view: The photographer is from Europe and when he saw this scene he decided to take a photo because in Europe this scene is very strange.

We think that the photographer was on the left side of the children. The photographer was crouching and he wasn’t very near or very far from the subject. We think that the photographer chose to compose the picture this way because he can see the two children working.

ii) Lighting: The light is natural and bright because the photo was taken in the afternoon and the sunlight shines. It is hard and contrasty. The elements that are in focus in the photo are the two children that are in the foreground.

The mood that the light transmits is of confort.

iii) Framing & Cropping: In the photo framing we can see the children cleaning the shoes. Outside the frame we think that there could be more shops and people going for a walk.

The photographer chose this way of framing because he wanted to show this impressive scene.

The cropping of the photo makes us give more importance to what the children are doing than to the other people that are in the background.

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The cropping focuses on the different situations of life that each child has.

3) Vivian Maier’s biography Maier was born in the United States in 1926 ​to an Austrian father and a French mother. She spent much of her childhood in France and likely became interested in photography at an early age.

She was ​born ​in 1930, ​in ​1951 she went to live to New York and ​in ​1956 to Chicago where she ​lived a lot of years, next she travelled to many countries. She was a street photographer and a movie director, she took photos every day without taking into account the results, also she collected books and newspapers.

4.The real story behind the photo We didn’t find information of the real story behind the photo. But we can know that Vivian took photos of outsides and to the people, objects, landscapes…

5. Conclusion

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We liked to do this project because it is a way of analyzing photos in group, talking about racism and child work. Talking about this theme is a very good idea because it is very important to make people aware of it and young people must fight against racism, xenophobia, homophobia, violence… We must fight for Human rights.

6.Bibliography Lago, Loly, “Visual literacy - theory”, Project: Working as a photojournalist, Virtual Classroom, <​http://www.edu.xunta.gal/centros/iesfene/​> [Accessed 25/05/2017] Wikipedia, “Viviam Maier”- biography, <​https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivian_Maier​ >

Google,

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