The Cambridge U3A class met for Five Facet of Photography – Photographs that Changed the World yesterday. This built on the first class, which established the pervasive capacity of the medium. There is any number of famous and recognisable photographs of seminal events that changed the world; my aim was to show some of the rarer photographs that changed the world. It’s often difficult to distinguish between the two.
I presented the chosen images under five headings:
- How we see things – opening our eyes to the beauty and mystery of the world
- What we see – bringing home things and events from far away
- Evidence – proof where proof is needed
- Campaigning – influencing decision makers
- Public attitudes – influencing perceptions
The categories overlap: it’s in the nature of all photography to exert some influence on attitudes and opinions. The themes were illustrated by 30 images, ranging historically from the Boulevard du Temple, Louis Daguerre, 1838, to David Kirby on this Deathbed, Therese Frare, 1990. The subjects ranged from war to medicine and landscape to space exploration. I argued that the pictures I included had initiated or reinforced real changes and had not just recorded important events. They also had one or more of the three additional qualities: newsworthiness, (good or bad); the ability to communicate a story that resonated across boundaries; and aesthetic qualities that make them memorable.