Who was Gordon Parks? Where he came from? What was he know for?
Background:
On November 30, 1912, in Fort Scott, Kansas. Sarah and Andrew Parks welcomed their fifteenth child who’s name was Gordon Roger Alexander Buchanan Parks, into their home. Gordon Parks grew up around violent racism, segregation, and poverty. Parks faced harsh discrimination as a child where his elementary school teachers discouraged African American students not pursue higher education. After the death of his mother, Sarah, when he was at the age of 14, Parks left home. He lived with relatives for a short period of time before standing up on his own, taking any kind of job where he could make money to live.
Intro:
Gordon Park was a self-taught artist who became the first African American Photographer and worked for Life and Vogue magazines. He was also a musician, writer, and film director, who played an important role in U.S. documentary photojournalism in the 1940s to 1970s—specifically in issues of civil rights, poverty, and African-Americans, and fashion and entertainment photography.
Gordon Parks’ Photography work-
Description of the photo:
American Gothic is a portrait of Ella Watson, who represents an African American black worker. Watson stands in the middle of the picture and in front of American Flag that hangs down the wall behind her. She is holding a broom in her right hand and mop leans against the wall. She is wearing a cleaning lady’s uniform with her hair pulled back.
What is the meaning of this photograph?
Gordon Park was the photographer who took Ella Watson’s photo in Washington D.C, in 1942 at Farm Security Administration. Parks approached to Watson who was a black charwoman. She was a cleaner at FSA offices. Watson told Parks her her life’ traggic experience that she had two daughter and her husband was shot to death two days before their second daughter was born.
One of thing most memorable things Gordon Parks said was:
This story made Gordon Parks to says that “I saw that the camera could be a weapon against poverty, against racism, against all sorts of social wrongs. I knew at that point I had to have a camera.”
Parks’ motive of taking this photo:
Parks motives while taking Ella Watson’s photo was to show the close perspective on the reality of black women. Parks used the camera to expose the evils of racism and shows the black people who suffered from racism.
