To be fair, I’m not a very good photographer. If I’m good at anything (though that’s questionable) it would have to be writing. It’s my belief that the job of a writer is to ask questions, to treat questions as if they were fledgling birds found dazed and disheveled at the base of a tree. We cup them in our hands, whisper to them, warm them with our breath and release them into the wind. We don’t direct them or tell them where to land. They fly off, and that’s that.
As the founder of CP, I spend a lot of time thinking about photography, cameras, and what it means to make pictures. Recently I’ve been craving some street photography, and it seems that my busy schedule may soon afford me an opportunity to do some street shooting, which is fantastic. I’m really looking forward to it.
But for more than a year now, a certain question has been gnawing at me that pertains to the craft and ethics of street shooting. Specifically, it involves photographing the downtrodden, impoverished and homeless among us.
After a year of occasional rumination, I’m no closer to a resolution. So without judgement, condescension, or pretense, I’d like to air some thoughts on the topic and hear what our readers have to say. Maybe together we can work out what it means (if indeed it means anything) to photograph those less fortunate than ourselves, and whether or not we should do it in the first place.
If you’re into street photography you’ve likely heard both sides’ vehement proclamations, so let’s examine the most common arguments for and against the practice of photographing the homeless.
Many who defend the making of this kind of photo are likely to first cite their right as a photographer to capture the world as they see it, and if that world happens to contain a homeless man begging for food, so be it. On the face of it, this is true. But let’s take a closer look at the “it’s my right” argument.
A photographer does indeed have the right to photograph people and things that are out in public spaces and within public view. At the same time, this right does not include the right to impinge upon another’s rights. Get it? For the sake of this conversation, the right that could be potentially violated by a street photographer is a person’s right to a reasonable expectation of privacy.
When we talk about violating a person’s reasonable expectation of privacy it’s very easy to agree what is a violation but more difficult to say what is not. Shooting through a bathroom window and capturing someone taking a shower, for example, is immoral, unethical, and illegal, and it’s an obvious violation of a person’s privacy. But when talking of shooting photos of the homeless, things get a bit less obvious and a bit more controversial. That’s because it’s a lot more difficult to define what is and is not a person’s private property if they, in fact, own no property.
And that’s what we encounter with the homeless. In the absence of a place to live, a person has no choice in the matter. Without a private, safe place, a homeless person has no choice but to be constantly on display in the public areas of the world. He or she is without privacy virtually 100 percent of the day. So how can someone who’s continually in public expect to have any privacy? Where does a homeless person’s private space begin and end?
One idea is that the homeless have no private space and are fair game. I’ve known people to callously remark that if the homeless don’t want to be photographed they should “get a home.” I don’t pretend to understand all of the massively complex causes and ramifications of homelessness. I do know, however, that dismissive flippancy toward those who are homeless is unhelpful at the best of times, and in all instances an ignorant vocalization of a repellant mind.
There’s an inverse school of thought that says the homeless are in a perpetual state of occupying their own private space. By virtue of their lacking any traditional private space of their own, they in essence occupy an invisible bubble of private space. By this logic, shooting a photo of any homeless person in any situation is an ethical transgression and a violation of that person’s reasonable expectation of privacy.
If you’re a photographer who follows the latter school of thought, any shot of a homeless person is an illegitimate work.
Beyond the rights of the subject or photographer we can also discuss the social commentary that may or may not be provided by photos of the homeless. Some say that to not photograph them is to do them a greater disservice than would be done by photographing them. The idea is that these marginalized, mistreated people are already overlooked and ignored by a society to which they’re invisible, and that failing to show them as they are will further propagate this mass ignorance.
I can understand this idea. Without grit, without dirt, all modern metropolises seem to gleam with brilliant light. The towering skyscrapers and gorgeous buildings tower over cosmopolitan men and women in perfect clothes. Were every photo to show only the perfect facets of city life we’d have a very warped perception of life in urban areas. Additionally, were every photo to show nothing but glitz, street photography would get tired very quickly. There needs to be a counter-point to the glitz and glamour. I get that.
Understanding the necessity that photography also show the darker side of life, if you were to ask any first-year college student to illustrate the extreme antipode of Wall Street would they not take you directly to a homeless shelter? I don’t know if they would, I’m only asking. But it seems to me that if a photographer’s looking to illustrate the dirtier side of a city, looking to show the grit, a shot of a homeless man sleeping under a Wall Street Journal is low-hanging-fruit indeed.
An artist, whether a painter, sculptor, or photographer, is never interested in the obvious. That’s the true genius of the artist. He or she sees something no one else noticed and presents it in a way that makes the viewer understand the importance of what he overlooked. A true artist takes an ordinary object, a person, an idea, manipulates it, and then shows it to others in a way that makes them wonder How’d I miss that?
So if the idea is to show the contrast between the “Haves” and the “Have-nots”, if the idea is to show just how difficult life can be, can’t we do it in a less obvious way? Shouldn’t we try a little harder to figure out a way of illustrating this without exploiting a person who’s quite literally at the lowest point of their life? I don’t know.
And the reason I don’t know is because there are some exceptionally talented photographers out there who have done incredible work with the homeless as their subjects.
Steve Huff, of the well-known website that bears his name, has just such a project. Where his work differentiates itself from the majority of uncommitted attempts is in its affirmation of these persons’ humanity. His work is more than just a snapshot of a homeless guy. His work is an introduction to a man, a telling of a story, and an earnestly presented lesson.
And there are others who strive to and very effectively tell the stories of the marginalized and destitute. After months of studying their works the unifying theme of these masters of photography seems, to me, to always come down to respect. The photographers who know how to respect a person’s innate rights are the ones who manage to make compelling shots of the homeless. If a photographer lacks this ability, perhaps it’s best to try a different subject.
Does this mean those of us with less talent don’t have a right to shoot the homeless? I’m not sure. As I said, this is a topic for me which inevitably leads to more questions. If you’ve spent some time thinking on it, let me know what you’ve come up with in the comments. Perhaps with your insight I can suss out my feelings on this and decide on a protocol for the future.
For now, I’ll keep avoiding those obvious shots and continue to regard the homeless as unfortunate souls who deserve respect and privacy. And if respecting another human being’s privacy means limiting the subjects I can photograph, that’s alright with me. Hell, they’ve got it a lot worse than I.
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