HW1_ Composition

http://www.michaelkenna.net/gallery.php?id=14

“Empire State Building from Twin Towers Viewfinder, New York City, USA, 1998”

Michael Kenna’s gallery contained photos of numerous well-known landmarks and locations in New York City from 1976-2010. I’ve always found landmarks of cities interesting, so these photos attracted my attention. The photo I chose is named “Empire State Building from Twin Towers Viewfinder, New York City, USA, 1998”. I chose this photo because it reminded me of one of the photos I took for the class activity last Wednesday. As the title mentions, the photograph was taken on the Twin Towers looking though the viewfinder. The picture is fuzzy and blurry, but you can still tell what building is being photographed. In my opinion, the longer you look at the photograph, the clearer the building looks. I believe Kenna’s intention was to show the viewer how recognizable the Empire State Building is. Even though the photo is not totally clear, you can still recognize one of NYC’s most known buildings.

The first formal element that comes to mind when looking at the photo is frame within a frame. Kenna uses the Twin Tower’s viewfinder to frame the Empire State Building and the other smaller building next to it. You could tell Kenna positioned the lens of the camera either inside of the view finder or zoomed into the viewfinder because of the darkness surrounding the main target (Empire State Building). Michael Kenna also used the rule of thirds. The Empire State Building is not exactly in the middle of the photo. It’s slightly offset to the right of the frame within the frame.