new york times photographs

Photojournalism continues to be one of the primary functions of photography. Certain photographs have formed our collective memories of a historic event; the ‘moment’ that Robert Capa captured during the Spanish Civil War of a falling soldier, went beyond merely showing that instant to become the defining face of the war. Such photographic moments are a critical part of information sources, the most important of which in the United States is the New York Times. New York Times, until recently, featured only one image on their cover, taking a radical approach in publishing. On their website, although the images are never the most prominent element, there are slide shows with distinct headings. These slideshows consist of 10-12 images, making a claim almost to encapsulate or summarize the given heading (e.g. Women of Afghanistan). I have taken these images and without editing any out, collapsed them together to create a single image; each headline corresponds to one image. This approach has enabled me to think about how I process these images or whether I process them at all. Furthermore, I was able to reconsider my understanding of the editing process, which images “make” it to the slideshow? Is there an iconography of photojournalism? What kinds of patterns emerge when you put all these images literally on top of each other? These ‘photographs’ do not draw conclusions, but rather start to pose questions on issues that are critical to understanding photojournalism and our collective processing of visual information.

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