Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2008/04/03

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Subject: [Leica] IMG: Home, II
From: images at comporium.net (Tina Manley)
Date: Thu Apr 3 07:40:14 2008
References: <200804022100.AON06798@rg5.comporium.net> <3cad89990804021958s393e8a71mfa1e4d1cef105b77@mail.gmail.com>

At 10:58 PM 4/2/2008, you wrote:
>Tina,
>Excellent photographs, and only too real,  but I deliberately do not take
>photographs of such people, it probably takes off the last veneer of dignity
>they have left. Besides, in India, its too easy.
>Cheers
>Jayanand
> >
> > http://www.pbase.com/image/95069931

I respectfully disagree, Jayanand.  I believe it gives people a 
certain dignity to be photographed.  Many, many years ago when I 
first started photographing in medical clinics in Central America, I 
was trying to be very respectful and only photograph the doctors and 
nurses as they worked.  One man came up to me and asked to be 
photographed.  He said something like - "Why are you only 
photographing the North Americans.  Are we not good enough or 
handsome enough for you to use your film on us?"  Since then, I have 
tried to show the beauty and the dignity of the people all over the 
world. The vast majority of the people that I photographed in India 
were very proud to have their photos made.  In this particular photo, 
I would not have photographed only the mother lying there by the side 
of the road, but the little boy sitting there so patiently by the 
side of a busy highway waiting for his mother to wake up gives the 
photo hope - to me.

I use my photos to raise money for self-help organizations and to 
raise awareness of conditions in other parts of the world.  You would 
be amazed at how ignorant most North Americans are about how the rest 
of the world lives.  I gave a talk last week about India and two of 
the comments were - "But all of our jobs have gone to India.  Every 
time I get someone on the phone for any kind of tech support, they 
were in India.  How could there be any homeless people when their 
economy is so much better than ours?"   and  "I always thought India 
was the dirtiest country in the world, but the people in your photos 
are beautiful.  They make me want to visit a place I never even considered."

Of all of the 47 countries I have visited so far, India is both the 
most beautiful and the most disturbing.  I have never seen such 
poverty anywhere else but I have never met such gentle, kind people 
either.  I hope other people will be able to see that in the photos 
that I'm working on now.

Tina


Tina Manley
http://leicatraveler.blogspot.com/
www.tinamanley.com 


Replies: Reply from jayanand at gmail.com (Jayanand Govindaraj) ([Leica] IMG: Home, II)
Reply from tedgrant at shaw.ca (Ted Grant) ([Leica] IMG: Home, II)
In reply to: Message from images at comporium.net (Tina Manley) ([Leica] IMG: Home, II)
Message from jayanand at gmail.com (Jayanand Govindaraj) ([Leica] IMG: Home, II)