Pictures are not only a visual presentation but mostly tend to communicate a lot of hidden meaning which would only be realized with critical analyses of the image. Gordon Parks, one of the most renown photographers in America, used his camera as a tool to communicate, and applied his photographic skills all through his life in a very educational and intellectual manner to represent the happenings in the ancient American society where there was a lot of divisions between the citizen on gender differences, races, social status and political ideologies (Walker and Gordon, 2012). He used the image below to represent the society that had mixed races and different social classes, which created a lot of divisions on racial biases. The Black Americans were the most affected and they held a lot of demonstrations and political rallies in a bid to bring equity, as in the case in the picture below. He combined the visual elements in all his work which was very essential in conveying the message he wanted to communicate as in the picture under discussion.
In a first glance of the picture, which was taken in Atlanta Georgia in 1956, I was able to notice a society that has mixed races, the whites and the blacks, which seem to be the caregivers. The moment in the image is light and joyous and the emotional impact it first created to me is neutral as though they are not smiling and seem to be in an equal agreement towards something, which represents a neutral moment. Having a further critic and analyses of the image, we can discuss how he has integrated different visual elements to create meaning in the picture.
Airline Terminal, Atlanta Georgia, 1956
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First, the content of the image is a representation of an American society who is in an airline terminal, more so understood to be a political one. The people seem to concentrate and focus in their own thoughts, which don’t seem to have much emotion, though not presented in this picture. Everyone is serious and just minding their business. On the back, there are two people which look like business men just having a conversation. There is also noticeable that there is only one black person, which is the person taking care of the baby- hence the uniform.
The context in this picture can easily be noted by tracing a historical background of Gordon Park’s pictures and also the evens that were taking place during this period. He was a very important and active fighter for equality and better treatment for the African- Americans and played a significant role in addressing essential aspects such as marginalization, poverty, and injustice. The representation of the black and white society in this picture is a symbolic representation of the long-awaited equity between the two races, an issue that has continued up to date. The image represents a lady in a higher class on the airline terminal with her baby and the caregiver thus the theme of equity and harmony being the main context in this picture
Parks focuses on the people in the front and the reaction it has towards the issue at hand. The picture has been taken at a close distance from the whole terminal; his main focus was on the lady with the baby and the lady next to her. By using this element, Parks is able to create meaning to his work as the context of the picture is to represent a mixed society of the White and Black-Americans, with an aim to show an equal society where they can associate well regardless of the differences in color and social background.
In the picture, there is also the use of the visual elements of color in the bid to create meaning to the picture. In some of the picture Parks captured in the ancient days, he mostly used the black and white colors but it is a different case in the picture under discussion. He has used a mixture of colors, which is the actual and natural color of the objects in the picture so as to make the image realistic and in a way it can be applied in the modern society. This has played an essential role in conveying the message at hand, of an integrated society with different races.
Conclusively, understanding an image is not only having a glance at it and quickly judging it but having an understanding of what the intended meaning is, which is realized by analyzing its elements. As discussed in the work above, it is evident how the visual elements come together to create meaning. To be able to understand the context in a picture, there is an essential need for one to understand the elements applied in it (Sullivan and Graeme, 2010). The visual elements are essential in the analyses of a picture as they act as the root and bases under which the meaning is constructed, for instance, a different choice in color or focus in a given picture would fully change the intended meaning. As in the picture above, if Parks had focused on the people on the far right, the whole context would shift and we would all focus on the context of the writings.
