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Margaret Bourke-White and Mary Ellen Mark are two of my heros. They are women
who didn't photograph as detached voyers, but as revolutionaries that seek to change and
improve the world. By exposing the truth and documenting the time Bourke-White has made a
positive impact on this world. Mark has followed Bourke-Whites humanitarian calling.
Her photos have informed people about mental institutions, the problems in India, and
helped to draw attention to homeless teenage runaways. Mark continues to photograph the
small people and the everyday problems, unlike Bourke-White who was the best photographer
on the scene, Mark wants to be the only photographer. |
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Margaret Bourke-White to Mary
Ellen Mark: Documentary Heritage
Mary Ellen Mark and Margaret Bourke-White are both considered
classic documentary photographers. Though their careers may seem to differ radically they
actually have a lot of similarities in their style and their lives. In 1971, the year that
Bourke-White died of Parkinsons disease at the age of 67, Mark was thirty years old
and still doing film stills and other freelance work. Mark had not yet decided to fully
pursue documentary photography, but she had already photographed all over the world and
produced her first book, Passport. In a few years Mark would become devoted to
documentary photography. After photographing her famous Ward 81 series she never
returned to the movies. Earlier in her career, after freelancing in New York City for a
year, Mark headed to India following in the footsteps of Bourke-White. Even before the Ward
81 series Mark was continuing Bourke-Whites work and style of documentary
photography. Markss photos are the late 20th century version of
Bourke-Whites early and mid 20th century work. Bourke-White and Mark
share many themes, some of their works differ drastically- this is because the are
responding to different times, different worlds, but they deal with these vastly different
worlds with the same techniques and methods.
In the early twenties Bourke-White went to seven different colleges
before she finally got her BA from Cornell. Just out of school she began photographing the
industrial goings on in Cleveland, and three years later in 1929 she began doing freelance
work for Fortune magazine. She continued doing industrial photography for Fortune
magazine, but also broadened her horizons and began to photograph an assortment of other
thingsfrom ad photography to feature articles from inside the Soviet Union. In 1936
she became one of the first staff photographers for Life magazine, it was her photo
of Fort Peck Dam that graced the first cover. During this time she was also working on
photo essay books on Americans. During World War II she photographed in the Soviet Union,
was the first female photographer in the US AirCorps, and was one of the first
photographers to see the Concentration camps. After the war she became interested in India
and began to photograph the Indian people as well as Gandhi. Later in her career she
started to do documentary work for Life and Fortune again, visiting the
mines in South Africa and Korean War. She had to stop her photographic career short
because of Parkinsons disease and died 1971. Bourke-White is one of the most famous
American photographers, she was also a woman succeeding in the male dominated world of the
1920s through 1950s she was the first women and even the first person to do a
lot of things (like photograph Lenin smiling). She is truly an American hero.
The life and times of Mark are as impressive as those of
Bourke-White. Mark was born in Philadelphia in 1940. She got a BFA in art and art history
in 1962. It was during her graduate studies at Annenberg School of Communication she
turned to photography. After graduation she applied for and got a Fulbright scholarship to
go to Turkey and photograph. Mark continued to travel and photograph after the scholarship
expired and for the rest of her life. In 1968 she like Bourke-White went to India for the
first of many times. She returned to America and moved to New York City were she took many
freelancing jobs doing movie stills. This lead to her 1970 photo essay "What the
English are doing about Heroin" published in Look. She published her first
book Passport, in 1974 as a sort of journal of her earlier and more recent travels.
Again movie stills led Mark to a photo series. Mark was shooting movie stills for the film
One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest on location in the Oregon State Hospital. She
met the women living in ward 81. The next year she returned to stay thirty six days
documenting the women. This collaboration with Karen Folger Jacobs became the famous book Ward
81. After the success of Ward 81 Mark returned to India, the first time in 1979
to photograph Mother Teresa and her charities and again in 1989, this time to photograph
for Life. Most recently she has been in India to photograph its circuses. In 1988
Mark earned the Worlds Press Award for Outstanding Lifes Work, and at the age of
forty eight- she has not showed signs of slowing yet.
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The life stories of Bourke-White and Mark are similar,
they are both women succeeding the world of documentary photography. But the true
similarities lie in their subject matter, style, and lastly career. Their subject matter
is sometimes shockingly similar. Take for instance Bourke-Whites Sweetfern,
Arkansas, 1936 (pl. 1) and Marks Damm Family in their Car, 1987 (pl. 2).
The subjects here are of the same demographic separated by six decades. They both depict a
family suffering due to poverty, a man and wife with a child (children). The house behind
Bourke-Whites Sweetfern, Arkansas becomes the car in Marks Damm
Family in their Car. In both photos the house and car are the families most important
possession, in reality are worth very little. Both families seem to teeter at the edge of
destruction. Both mothers look off into the distance as if the struggle to survive each
day has taken a immense toll. The men adopt a supportive posture, in Sweetfern,
Arkansas the father sits defensively while holding a stick and looking at the camera,
he leans in towards his family. In Damm Family in Their Car the father holds the
mother and, like the other father, stares in to the camera. The two families wear shabby
attire, the boy in Sweetfern, Arkansas doesnt even have pants. The tonal
ranges are more similar than these reproductions show. The Bourke-White has a more gentle
contrast than shown. The major difference lies in the composition, though diagonals are
prevalent in both. Mark photographed the Damm family for her "Homeless Family"
series, Bourke-White photographed the family in Sweetfern for her book You Have Seen
Their Faces. Bourke-White and Mark are using the same methods and treating the
subjects. The viewer does not only feel pity for these families, they also feel a sadness
for them because the photographs treat them as people so they are able to feel for them
like they would their family and friends. Mark and Bourke-White got to know their
subjects, though it is apparent in these photos that Mark knew her subjects a little
better, they seem more comfortable and relaxed. The two photographs invite the viewer in
the world of the subjects by portraying them in their typical surroundings. Both
Bourke-White and Mark feel sympathetic for these poverty stricken families and are
striving for change with these photos. Documentary photography is trying to say something,
these photos are revealing as to inspire help for people in these situations.
There are many other Mark and Bourke-White photos that are very
similar from the same time periods, like Bourke-Whites East Feliciana Parish,
Louisiana, 1936 (pl. 3) and Marks Robert Taylor Homes, Chicago, Illinois,
1987 (pl. 4). Both pictures show a young African American boy (with a dog in East
Feliciana Parish, or a little brother in Robert Taylor Homes, Chicago). Without
a parent in frame both boys stand in their cheap and worn housing. From the newspaper
wallpaper in East Feliciana Parish to the mattresses sans bed sheets in Robert
Taylor Homes, the homes that these boys live in give a good idea of how their life is.
The boy in the Marks photo is staring into the camera as is his little brother,
still in diapers he seems jaded as does his brother who is already bandaged. This clashes
with the boy in Robert Taylor Homes who stares off to the side avoiding the
cameras gaze. The light comes from the side of the fame and lights his youthful face
with a angelic glow, making the viewer think of innocence exploited Whereas the Mark photo
Robert Taylor Homes with the confronting stare of the young boys is about lost
innocence. Like Sweetfern, Arkansas and Damm Family in their Car the boys in
Bourke-Whites and Marks photos are of the same poverty stricken demographic. |

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The differences in their housing and attitude reflect
the changes that America has experienced during the fifty one years separating them. The
poorer neighborhoods have been getting increasingly violent, younger and younger children
are committing and dealing with violence. The number of violent acts committed by children
under the age of 18 has been on the rise since the early 1980s. The confronting
stares of the young boys in Robert Taylor Homes signifies the alertness and
attitude a child in the projects must grow-up with. The housing in both photos also offers
an insight into their lives and the changes that have taken place over those 51 years. The
Bourke-White photo show the boy in a run down house- but the house was his at least rented
and kept up by his family. The neighborhood probably had an assortment of different
members from the law abiding hard working people to the out of work and out of luck
families. In Robert Taylor Homes the boys house is in the infamous Robert
Taylor housing project in Chicago, Illinois. Housing projects are usually in the poorest
and most crime ridden area of town (Robert Taylor is no exception), the schools are
usually subpar and the housing inatqutite. People on welfare are sent to these projects by
the hundreds, but there they do not find a supportive community, they simply find urban
decay. East Feliciana Parish is about the rural poor and Robert Taylor Homes
is about the urban poor. In the 1930s when Bourke-White took East Feliciana
Parish the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression were at hand. The country (even the
government with the FSA) was watching the rural lower class (and even middle class) lose
everything they owned. This is not to say that urban poverty was not a problem in the
1930s it just wasnt the focus of the countrys attention. Today America
is focused on the failure of the projects and the rapid decay of many urban centers.
Bourke-White and Mark know what was important to the country and the time- they
photographed it and brought it to the attention of the world.
The similarities between Bourke-White and Mark go deeper than their
mutual interest in the American poor and their sympathetic portrayal of these people. They
shared a fascination with India and its people, they both spent extended periods
photographing there. Bourke-White was able to meet and photograph Gandhi, over thirty
years later Mark was in India photographing Indias other saint, Mother Teresa. They
both enjoyed travel and photographed abroad extensively in the Soviet Union, Europe, and
Asia. The middle and end of Bourke-Whites career is most akin to Marks. From
the very start of her career Marks focus has been people, it wasnt until the
1930s and later that Bourke-White began to use people as her focus and even then not
always. It is the way these women view and capture people that is so similar. In 1963
Bourke-White was quoted about her photographs during the Dust Bowl, "this was the
beginning of my awareness of people in a human, sympathetic sense as subjects for the
camera and photographed against a wider canvas then I had ever perceived before."
(Callahan 13). This "sympathetic sense" can be seen in her Life photos,
her documents of the concentration camps, and in her pictures from India. From the first
of her documentary work Mark has had clear concept about how she wants to use documentary
photography and what she is trying to achieve through it. She strives to find the
universals, to show real people to real people. "To touch on peoples lives [in
a way they] havent been touched on before, its fascinating. You know,
its one thing if [a celebrity] has an incredible character and youre really
going to be able to delve into their personalitythats great. But you can never
get real purity if people have been spoiled by the camera and dont trust you. I like
feeling that Im able to be a voice for those people that arent famous, the
people that dont have the great opportunities." (Fulton 26) These two women can
be easily described as humanist in their desire to show people something they hadnt
seen or cared to noticed before, a by doing so illicit change.
It is obvious that the careers of Bourke-White and Mark are far from
being identical; they are different people photographing at different times. The world is
changing at an ever increasing rate. The world that Bourke-White grew up in and
photographed was a vastly different place than the one that Mark, thirty six years her
junior, did her growing up and photographing in. Bourke-White started her career
photographing the industrial aesthetic in epic form. Architecture and machines were her
subjects, not the people of her later years. Thanks to Alfred Steglitz and Paul Strand the
machine aesthetic was in full swing. America was booming and production was at an all time
high, the photographs and other art from this time reflect this excitement. America was,
for the first time, the superpower it is today. Electricity, indoor plumbing, cars,
planes, factories, grand architecture, and other industrial achievements had come so fast
people were in awe of it. Bourke-White found it easy to photograph these factories,
buildings, and workers in an epic way. It was from her industrial base that Bourke-White
discovered and explored other subjects. She didnt lack skill in tackling more
emotional charged subjects like her India photos or her photos in Korea. |
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From the earliest days of Marks career people were always her
subjects, from the people in Passport to the people in her movie stills. The
interest with industry has faded as we become more accustom to living with new
technologies. But now the focus becomes the human condition, which is due in part to World
War II and the very personal effect it had on most of the world. Mark tries to find out
about her subjects, to talk to them and get to know them some. Some documentary
photographers and critics criticize this saying that she isnt being objective- some
say its great and she is getting deeper more powerful pictures. Unlike Bourke-White,
Mark refuses to cover current newsBourke-White did this a lot during World War II
and in India. Now Mark only photographs what she wants and how she wants it. She goes for
the long term stories rather than short term glory, she picked projects that she felt
personally attached too. Mark was thrilled when she got the go ahead from Life to
photograph Mother Teresa Missions of Charities. The subjects Marks photos of India
are much like Bourke-Whites. Two of the most comparable works are
Bourke-Whites The Monsoon Failed this Year, India, 1946. (pl. 5) and
Marks Goudi at Home for the Dying, Mother Teresas Missions of Charity,
Calcutta, 1981. (pl. 6). These photos are both of women, again probably of the same
class. The subjects are remarkably similar in nature, both women are suffering in many
ways. Bourke-Whites The Monsoon Failed this Year shows a older woman getting
rice- she is almost skeletal with the bones in her arm showing through her skin. The same
can be said about Goudi in Marks photo. Goudis arms and legs poke out of her
gown like sticks. from. Both pictures depict almost identical subject with an immense
emotional presence. Bourkes photo is high in contrast with a harsh light coming from
the upper right of the subjects. The woman is alone, she looks as if she has been caught
mid motion, as looks out away from the camera. In contrast Marks photo has a large
tonal range and flat lighting and little shadow. Her subject, Goudi, looks into the camera
as does another women behind her, they seem comfortable but interested with the camera.
Mark captures a larger picture, she includes Goudis surroundings as well as the
people that she shares it with. In Bourke-Whites the woman stands alone out of
contextas Americans the viewers can only guess where she is or what she is doing.
Without the eye contact that Goudi gives, the women in Bourke-Whites picture is
disconnected from the viewer and thus not as powerful. By allowing Goudis eye
contact with the camera and by simply letting the viewer know Goudis name, Mark
draws the audience into Goudis world and makes them see her as a real human. While
the subjects are very similar and the sensitive way the two photographers dealt with them
is analogous, the actual composition and tonality is totally different. This maybe due to
the fact that Mark was able to travel and photograph without a writer. She had no
narrative to follow, she was in charge and had to make no compromises. [But for the most
part the differences shown here are the most obvious differences.] Bourke-White
photographed the whole picture, as with her industrial and aerial work, or the little
picture, each person as single entity. On the other hand Mark photographs in between; her
photos either have a great depth to them or they are full of significant details. Mark is
more intimate with her subjects, she spends weeks at a time with them, Bourke-White was
from a more strict tradition of documentary photography, up until recently documentary
photographers tried to keep a distance between them and their subjects, to keep their
objectivity. Photographers now know there is little objectivity to begin with, and it is
now understood that getting a more personal knowledge of the subject leads to a more
informative picture.
Since its origins with the advent of photography documentary
photography has been evolving. Bourke-White marks the evolution from the machine aesthetic
to the more human approach. She was perhaps the most famous and respected photographer of
her time, she moved the art of photography and science of journalism ahead. By exposing
the truth and documenting the time Bourke-White has made a positive impact on this world.
Her photos of India are our historical documents of their revolution, her photos of the
concentration camps made the world now the extent of mans inhumanity to man, and her
photos of the rural poor help to institute the works programs of the New Deal. Mark has
followed Bourke-Whites humanitarian calling. Her photos have informed people about
mental institutions, the problems in India, and helped to draw attention to homeless
teenage runaways. Mark continues to photograph the small people and the everyday problems,
unlike Bourke-White who was the best photographer on the scene, Mark wants to be the only
photographer. |
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Bibliography
Callahan, Sean, eds. The Photographs of Margaret Bourke-White. New
York: New York Graphic Society, 1972
Fulton, Marianne. Mary Ellen Mark 25 Years. Boston: Little
Brown and Company, 1991
Goldenberg, Vicki. Margaret Bourke-White: a Biography. New
York: Harper and Row, 1986.
Mark, Mary Ellen. Passport. New York: Lustrum Press, 1974
Mark, Mary Ellen. Ward 81. New York: Simon and Schuster,
1979.
Rosenblum, Naomi. A History of Women Photographers. New York:
Abbeville Publishing Group, 1994.
Rosenblum, Naomi. A World History of Photography. New York:
Abbeville, 1997.
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(C) 1997 Sarah Wichlacz |