Migration is a very topical issue in the media today and subsequently there are lots of photos about migration and migrants. Migration and the ‘issues’ surrounding it interest me after all it was a factor in one of the biggest political decisions this country has faced in the past few years. A quick google image search or even just looking through articles in newspapers shows that migration and indeed migrants are often shown in a negative way. This is partially due to the photos that are taken of migrants and how they are shown through portraiture.
Photos like this are often captured by photographers and then sent to large media companies who publish them usually in a negative way. The issues with photos like this is they portray migrants in a negative light and fail to capture the human side of the story. In fact, in his book ways of seeing, John Berger states ”An image is a sight which has been recreated or reproduced. It is an appearance, or a set of appearances, which has been detached from the place and time in which it first made its appearance” (6). Sometimes this detachment from the original appearance can produce something that looks drastically different. Photo B is inferring all these people appearing to vandalise and even appear violent. Photo C seems to show many people which may have a negative effect on people’s views of migrants in countries such as the UK where many believe that migrants ‘steal jobs’. This is all because the photo makes it seem that the amount of people trying to enter the UK is infinite as the line of people goes from the front to the back of the shot. A bad thing about photography in this situation is it captures a moment and that moment is not always a good representation of what is going on. There isn’t always a clear story as to what is going on in a photo and this can lead to people getting the wrong message or even people manipulating the image to enforce their views on others. ”The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe” (6) and if we are told something about the image and don’t know any better, then we will believe this. Many newspapers publish articles on their front pages accompanied with photos that portray immigration in a negative way. Such as this one from the daily mail. The soldiers are seen looking down upon the migrants, portraying them in a negative way.
But once every now and then an image comes to light which does show the human side of the story, For instance the one of the drowned boy. This image went viral almost immediately mainly due to the human aspect of the shot. It helped change many people’s views on migrants from being very negative to being more accepting. It’s unfortunate that an image so tragic is needed to change people’s views on something like this but this equally makes the image extremely powerful.
Stereotypes of migrants are that they travel from one country to another but in today’s world each and every one of us can be seen as a migrant. It is easier than ever to travel to any part of the world and start a new life there whether it be flying halfway round the world or traveling across to the next town on a train. In this sense it makes the usual use of the word migrant and how it is often represented in the media very wrong.
This is what I plan to focus on in my final project, capturing people as they are migrating on public transport, trains. To do this I have researched the work by Stephen Gill on the same topic of people on trains titled day return (1). In this project Stephen captures people through candid portraiture sitting on the train on multiple journeys from London Liverpool street to Southend Victoria. It is an interesting project as most of us on the train do not pay attention to our surroundings and the people who are around us. We also don’t realise what us ourselves are doing whist sitting on the train, so it is interesting to see this when captured in a photograph. He says himself he is merely “looking at things that we know very well, but rarely have the chance to stop and stare at”(2) and it can be these everyday things that can sometimes produce the most interesting photos. Stephen really captures the mood of the journey as all the subjects have similar facial expressions and are all looking out the window. It is difficult to believe that Stephen got so close to the subjects without alerting them or changing their facial expressions (3) and this is something I believe I will find very hard to recreate when I try to do my project. I may have to ask for people’s permission for their photo beforehand. Â Stephen Gill undertook this project in 2002 which was now 15 years ago, it will be interesting to compare my final photos to those that he took 15 years ago and see if anything has changed such as someone’s emotions whilst on the train or their clothing and what they are carrying with them.
Tom Wood did a similar project in Liverpool over the space of 20 years. He travelled around the city on buses during off peak hours and capturing photos of those who were on the bus (4). Tom in this time managed to shoot over 3,000 different photos. The photos have since been published across the space of 2 books. The first being All Zones of Peak (1998) and the second being Bus odyssey (2001) (5). Due to this work being spaced out over 20 years Tom manages to capture things we wouldn’t notice everyday, such as changing fashion. This is something I won’t be able to capture in my project as I only have a few weeks. However, in this time I will be able to capture things such as facial expressions and whether they change depending on what time of day it is.
In conclusion I plan to create similar work to that produced by Stephen Gill and Tom Wood in which I capture the migration of people. I believe it will be difficult to capture without asking for public permission first, so my images may not capture the true emotions I plan to catch but I will see how it goes. Having never used a proper camera before coming to University I am still getting to grips with how the camera works and how to produce the best photo, but I am slowly improving at this so hopefully will be able to capture some good photos.
References
| No. | Title of article | Name of author | Date of publication | URL | Date viewed |
| (1) | Day return | Stephen Gill | Not given |
https://www.stephengill.co.uk/portfolio/portfolio/nggallery/album-1-2/day-return/thumbnails
|
22th November 2017 |
| (2) | Stephen Gill and photographing the everyday invisible | Dan Hill | May 2005 |
http://www.cityofsound.com/blog/2005/05/stephen_gill_an.html
|
22th November 2017 |
| (3) | Stephen Gill: Day return | Tim Jobling | November 2010 |
http://timj3rdyearphoto.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/stephen-gill-day-return.html
|
26th November |
| (4) | Making sense | Jane Fletcher | Not mentioned | http://issuemagazine.com/tom-wood-making-sense/2/#/ | 27th November |
| (5) |
Tom Wood: Photographs 1973-2013 |
Not given | Not mentioned | https://www.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/what-was-on/tom-wood-photographs-1973-2013 | 27th November |
| (6) | Ways of seeing | John Berger | Penguin books in 1977 | Chapter 1 pages 8-9 | 1st December |
Photo sources
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