http://eugenerichards.com/stepping-through-the-ashes/olk8a43zlzbi1bu0dqnwajygtdnjjg
The photograph that spoke out to me and really held my attention would have to be one featured in a book called ‘Stepping Through The Ashes” by Eugene Richards. This collection of photos were taken after the 9/11 Attack on the US and the photo in particular features a young boy gazing out to the people who attended the funeral of a brave firefighter David Fontana who have lost his life to such tragic event. The intention to capture such photo was to show the sacrifice people made so that others, such as the young boy could have the chance to live through it, learn from it and potentially can make a change so that such event will never happen again. The purpose of this image is to show the aftermath of this attack and what it left behind, death, sorrow, anger, hope and faith. These type of emotions also set the mood of the photo plus given the fact that its in black and white, it can also represent the lifeless and colorless world that people saw at that moment.
Along with the emotion that the photo convey are formal elements like figure to ground, pattern and repetition and fill the frame. In this photo the figure is the young boy’s head compared to the ground which will be the funeral service that is going on in the background, this element is also achieved by making the silhouette of the boy’s head more smooth and blurred out. The pattern and repetition in this photo are the hats that the police officers have on, this pattern goes throughout the entire photo but its interrupted by the head of the young boy. The last element is fill in the frame because although the subject isn’t clear the photo does show a close- up, how he is positioned and his expression.
This is a great example of figure to ground. the boy’s head is large and out of focus. It give a sense of his emotional state or maybe his loss. there is a very large contrast of scale between the foreground and the background. The people there, reduced to tiny, do become a sort of pattern. And this is a good example of filling the frame. Every part of the image is active.