Well,
We start with the assumption that this child was homeless and maybe begging. The image of a child alone, apparently abandoned is heartbreaking. The picture is well constructed, gets my attention and is riveting. no technical details need be discussed therefore. It's the moral wrappings of this that come to the fore.
This picture sparked extreme points of view. I have been troubled by this who idea of street photography whether by using a double lenses Mamiya 330looking down into the belly of a black beast, smartly with a Bresson flair and a Leica or by hunting from across the street with a telephoto. Still, I do it and one always should feel guilt, even though it's legal, at least in the USA, it's robbing of a sort. Here's an organization one should study and maybe donate to to counterbalance one's trespasses, although it won't make you innocent! It's called "Picture The Homeless" which does try to fight for the rights of street people.
Cem's Response: Abhijit, while I am taken back by the force of Cem's response, and it is strong, it's driven by a set of strong moral values. I'm sure it knocked a lot of folk off their feet. Actually Cem is one of the fairest people I know and talented in his own right as a photographer. If you can step back a little from the shear force of his statement,
there is a clear moral impediment to our photographing whatever we want especially from those who cannot give consent or who are powerless to object.
So let me start somewhere easy: I love to photograph children. Almost always I try to identify the parents and ask permission. Otherwise they might be terrified about the safety of their children. Still, at the skyline, kids playing and no identification possible I squeeze the shutter, feeling I still have trespassed. I photograph a lot of people in the studio and outside in all positions and poses. If by chance any are disliked by the person, they are generally deleted immediately. If I notice exposure that was unintended, it goes too.
The camera can see far better than an eye and what's visible in the street for seconds is frozen in a photograph for eternity. To me the photographer will always be the hunter, even when hired, as he is far more skilled and cunning than the client could imagine. So we must realize, we are no less than men with guns, except our cameras take silently. When one sees this little girl, it's something of that. We have empathy, for sure. Still it's a freebee! There are no adults to intervene! We take the picture because she is weak and helpless with no parents there to shield her. She has become, in fact, a leaf fallen from the tree that could be blown by a puff of wind anywhere.
So if one takes such a picture, at the least, here's what one can do:
- Make a point of giving alms to the child so at least she'll be fed that day.
- Don't insert yourself in her life, just but get food from a stand and walk on.
- Better you are with a woman.
- Don't remove the child ever!
- Come back each day if you can and give alms but not as a friend. You will break her heart.
- Inquire of local charity groups as to who might take her in. Ask friends to pitch in with you a little to cover expenses for the charity.
- Offer free photography services for the charity.
- When you publish the picture, explain her plight and hold up the rest of us to shame for this.
With all this you and I are still not off scott free as we benefit greatly from this outstanding and sensitive picture. But we are in fact like the lion who rips apart Bambi, (the little beautiful deer), and shows how screwed up our sense of morality really is! One cannot tell the lion to eat rice nor the street photographer to only capture kisses! So we are no more advanced than that princely beast of a lion then when we take from people against their will.
However,
without Cem's strong, clear, unswerving, (yes Doug, even perhaps rude and ruthless), condemnation, we can get away with just being "artists", when in fact we are hunters and should not have a clear conscience for it! When communities don't have anyone saying, "Consider what you are doing, it's wrong!", we might lose one key voice in our understanding of things.
Asher
BTW, was the kid begging or just a regular playful kid resting? Is this really a homeless child or just wearing what other kids wear?
Still, if one lies or fails to show about what's really about us, then the lights and the windows of the tour bus may as well be blacked out anywhere things are not perfect!