Paper and Ink Is the Only Way

Every so often (many will tell you far too rarely) something will set me into a cleaning or organizing frenzy of sorts.  I think some subconscious part of my brain, after staring at a pile of stuff in search of the right place, will solve the problem, and at that moment I can't wait to get everything taken care of.

Today, it was the case of a stack of various photo magazines in my office.  I started by flipping through them, remembering why I'd kept them around, then putting them in order, then placing them where I thought they belonged.  It was indeed satisfying.

But in the process, I was reminded of a lot of truly great work by photographers, and I came to think: the magazine (and by extension, the book) is really the best, the only medium for documentary photography and its various relatives.

Unlike much "art" photography, a lot of documentary work just isn't something that calls to you to buy a print and hang it in the living room of your posh Bel Air estate.  I mean, who want to walk into the family room to the scene of heroin users shooting up in gritty black-and-white?  Even the simpler, less grotesque images of, say, a run down Appalachian neighborhood are kind of sketchy, in my opinion.

Now, one could argue (as I often have) that not all documentary work needs to be gritty and downbeat.  As a matter of fact, I tend to get frustrated (and have written here and in NPPA's News Photographer magazine) when every prize seems to go to a "compelling portrait" of the disgusting life of gay, black insane people on drugs in forgotten neighborhoods.  I mean, really, wouldn't it take more talent to show all the facets of a hardworking high school athlete, or explain how someone could be truly happy as a farmer in the Midwest (not enraged and frustrated, things which are I think remarkably simple to photograph)?  But, as they say, I digress ...

Where I was headed was this: the magazine format, that thing in your hands, is perfect for showing a story.  You page through, the pictures are revealed -- some bigger and grand, some small and delicate -- in an order and in an arrangement that display the art, tell the story, and are -- by their arrangement -- an artwork in themselves.  You can show a single image, or a whole series in a slowly unfolding tale.  With a book -- a nicer, longer version of the magazine -- you can do the same.

Sure, you can put photos online, and you can even arrange them artistically, but it lacks something, a sense of presence, something tangible.  It's just not the same when you lean into the screen to study some detail, not like looking at a page ...

Long live dead tree magazines!