The photo series I picked from New York Times Lens Blog is A Father, A Son, A Disease, and A Camera. We can get the story from the title even we haven’t seen the photos. It is a story about a man fought with a disease and his son recorded it with a camera. It is a touching story about life and family. A man was at the end of his life and his family was taking turns to take care of him. His son was trying to capture the last couple years of his life.
The photos are all about the sick father. The father is the main subject matter in this photo series. It contains medium shot, extreme medium shot, long shot and few close up shot. These photographs basically on chronologic order. After the father was diagnosed early onset Alzheimer’s disease his son was decided to take photos of him with his family members. He was getting weaker and weaker. At the beginning of the photograph, he could be swimming by himself. Also, got dressed, ate food and took shower were not a problem for him. Then as he getting sicker. He needed to help to go for a walk, his son should stay with him when he was taking shower. He used to be an active person, however, was locked in the room in case something happened. He needed a caretaker to do all the things for him. At his last day, his family members were gathering around his bed to comfort him. Finally, he passed away his kids buried his ashes at a park of his hometown where could see his old house. If the photographs were in backward it still could make sense, but won’t be as moving in this chronological order. Because you already know what happened in the end. If we don’t know the result when we reading this story it gives us hopes that maybe he could be treated in the end.
The most touching photographs in this series are the one that the father was lying on the bed and his family members are gathering around the bed to talk to him. Everybody looks depressed. He was facing towards his ex-wife and staring at her. His ex-wife placed her hand on his shoulder and was looking at him as well. His son was grasping his arm and look away from him. His daughter was leaning on his bed and staring at him. The interaction between them and the motion they were being captured was extremely emotional. The photographer placed the main subject matter at the rule of thirds and filled other people in the frame. This series of photos are all in black and white which indicate the last journey of the father’s life and the light is coming from the side of the photos in this picture. This series of pictures of A Father, A Son, A Disease, and A Camera is a successful storytelling photograph. Because I can get the story even I didn’t read the content beside the photos.
Interesting to think of this story told in reverse order. Certainly, death is inevitable so the plot is not surprising. Maybe it would be even more heartbreaking.
It should be noted that the story is not told in strict chronological order with pix from 2015 occurring after 2016. As I look at the story again, it is so much about the loss of personal independence that I think the pix were ordered to tell this story.