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Throughout photographic history, the threshold that many artists had to overcome was conveying the meaning of their photographs to the public if any at all, and the orientation of the subjects in their photography. The intent of portrait photography is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the subject. Nineteenth century photo historian Alan Trachtenberg notes, “Aspiring professionals wrestled with the problem: how to arrange their sitters and manipulate the often fickle medium to produce not just a picture but a pleasing one--not just a likeness but a portrait”(Trachtenberg, 24). Through these words of Trachtenberg, we can deduce that the main problem was how photographers manipulate their subjects in a way that would …show more content…

The strained and forlorned look on the woman’s face, especially after becoming homeless and on the road for a long time with her three children and limited supplies. “If our work is to carry force and meaning to our view we must be willing to go all out”(Lange, 264) was what Lange had said soon after Migrant Mother was taken. Since she was part of a field operation documenting the reality of the situation of the time, her goal was to make the images she took available to the public eye and hopefully get a positive response to them. Because of her decision to take the photos of the woman with her children, she managed to capture the attention of the millions of Americans and had them witness the full impact of the collapse of the economy and its effect on the people living in constant turmoil and strife because of it from the viewpoint of a set of images taken by a simple camera. The demand of these set of images was to invoke a voice from the people in order for them to urge the current government at that time to take action and fast before significant damage could be inflicted onto the soil of the already wounded country. One more example of this is shown in another one of Arbus’ images entitled Child with a Toy Hand Grenade in which it depicts a child holding what seems to be a mock grenade in the middle of Central Park. Aside from this single image, the other images taken of the boy shows him at play, frolicking around while Arbus took the photos of him in a

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