| Unit name | Documentary Styles: Photography and Film in the United States 1890-1960 |
|---|---|
| Unit code | HARTM0324 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | M/7 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12) |
| Unit director | Dr. Haran |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of History of Art (Historical Studies) |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
In this module we look at the great welter of photographs and films produced in America under the apparently rival categories of Art and Documentary. Indeed, rather than accepting this bipartition we investigate the complex and interconnected area of 'photographic media' in order to open up a new area of inquiry into photography and film as parallel and occasionally symbiotic practices. We look at the roles of these media in defining identity, in terms of class, race, and gender, in considering photographers and filmmakers' responses to a dramatically changing society. The course covers a long historical period but most of the material is concentrated in the latter decades, with the years 1890-1930 essentially introducing the main areas: commercial photography for advertising and magazines (Fortune and Vanity Fair), New Deal documentary photography and film of the 1930s, radical film and photo activism, developments in 'art photography', large scale exhibitions in the 1940s and 1950s at the Museum of Modern Art, the birth of the avant-garde film movement, and interconnections between Hollywood and experimental cinema. We look at many photographers and filmmakers including Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Gertrude Kasebier, Paul Strand, Charles Sheeler, Walker Evans, Ralph Steiner, Edward Weston, Artkino, the Workers Film and Photo League, Margaret Bourke-White, Ansel Adams, Berenice Abbott, Maya Deren, Gordon Parks, Dorothea Lange, Pare Lorentz, and Robert Frank.
Aims:
Seminars
5000 word essay
