Assignment 1

The most important issue raised in this text was what is considered acceptable in terms of documentary photography. For example, the manipulation of an image to tell a story, or to support a story, that was never actually in the photograph. Within photojournalism, telling the whole truth is very important and people have lost their jobs in the past over photo manipulation. With the advances of photoshop it is very easy to change an image, however, you then start to cause your audience to question the truth. Manipulation can also change the way a viewer responds to an event/article. A supporting argument for this would be the cover of TIME magazine with a picture of O.J. Simpson. His face has been made a lot darker than the original, and in American society, darker skinned people are often associated with serious crimes, more so than white people.

Assignment 3: Politics

Ashely Gilbertson Photography is political in more than one way. Firstly, it is political because because it raises awareness of political issues, and secondly, what is featured in the photograph can some times create controversy. Ashley Gilberston is an Australian photographer based in New York who has worked in Iraq and photographed the bedrooms of the soldiers once they have passed away. He highlights in his images that suicide is a leading cause for death in the war, rather than battlewounds. The above photograph is from a collection he did after the fall of the economy in 2008. It is documentary in style, but also raises awareness of the issue of unemployment since the decline of the stock exchange. His work is incredibly thought provoking and moving.

http://www.ashleygilbertson.com/projects/recession_new_york/recession_new_york_14.html

Assignment 2: value of images

There are many reasons to put value upon an image. Images can hold monetary, social and political value. The reason for this value is that the image could have been the first of it's style, it was produced by somebody famous or it has a strong message in a historical/political way. Woman III by Willem de Kooning is the second most expensive painting ever sold selling for $137.5 million in 2006.
In today's society images also hold a lot of value in that they can inform nations of people about events from large distances away.

Woman III by Willem de Kooning

http://listverse.com/2007/11/07/top-10-most-expensive-paintings/