The positioning of Diane Arbus as a documentary photographer stems from the two exhibits that made her reputation, both curated by John Szarkowski: the group show New Documents in 1967 claimed to show documentary photography’s new direction, which Szarkowski said aimed “not to reform life, but to know it”, and Diane Arbus, the posthumous one-woman show five years later, which turned her into an icon. Even as Szarkowski identified Arbus’ work with the documentary tradition, both the American reformist line and the European taxonomic line represented by August Sanders (who came to be known in the United States in the 1960s), he also indicated the ways in which her work did not fit. If the documentary tradition displayed a consistent style of clarity and directness toward reality, it also displayed in the American tradition a particular emphasis on human suffering and a blend of realism and emotional charge, which was meant, in the words of Roy Stryker, the director of the Farm Security Administration, which sponsored the great documentary photography of the Depression era, to “incite change” by mobilizing sympathy. These two documentary modes—that of “knowing” and that of “reforming”—were tangling and untangling in the 1960s. For instance Walker Evans, who made his name with the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s, delivered his important lecture on “lyric documentary at Yale in 1964 in which he eschewed the social reform agenda; in 1966, the year before New Documents, the Farm Security Administration spirit had been revived by Cornell Capa’s exhibition The Concerned Photographer, and its similarly titled catalog, and the documentary practices it celebrated made for some of the most arresting images and photo-essays of the Vietnam War.
That Arbus fulfilled the realist impulse of the documentary tradition could hardly be more obvious, whatever her subject matter. But documentary stuck to Arbus through the powerful intervention not only of Szarkowski but also of Susan Sontag, Arbus first and still most influential critic. Sontag’s essay on the 1972 exhibit, which launched her inquiry into the medium of photography, is still routinely cited in reviews and scholarship on Arbus’ work. Sontag framed the problem of Arbus’s photographs within the documentary tradition following Szarkowski, and defined her work as a misappropriation of its form. Sontag claimed that Arbus photographed and collected other people’s pain but offered no “compassionate purpose” to the viewer. In these terms, Arbus lacked empathy and the photographs offered a “self-willed test of hardness,” one that inured the viewer to ugliness and pain. Sontag attached Arbus to one version of the documentary tradition, the US reformist agenda, and found Arbus’ ability to mobilize sentiment not only deficient but also corrosive of sympathetic sensibilities more broadly.
1. The passage suggests that the photographs of August Sanders were
A) an important influence on Diane Arbus’ work
B) likely viewed in Europe as misappropriating the documentary form
C) probably not familiar to most viewers of Arbus’ work
D) included in exhibits that were curated by Szarkowski
E) not intended to elicit sympathy from viewers
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2. According to the passage, which of the following is a way in which the American documentary tradition and European documentary tradition differed?
A) The American tradition encompassed a greater diversity of subjects than was typically found in the European tradition.
B) The European tradition drew on long-standing aesthetic precedents derived from other representational arts, whereas the American tradition did not.
C) The American tradition was meant to evoke an empathetic response in the viewer, whereas the European tradition was not.
D) Photographs in the European tradition displayed a more consistent clarity of style than those in the American tradition.
E) The American tradition was motivated by a greater realist impulse than the European tradition was.
3. The author of the passage mentions “Sontag’s essay on the 1972 exhibit” primarily in order to
A) show how Arbus’ work altered Sontag’s view of documentary photography
B) suggest that Arbus’ motivations were revealed in her selection of subjects
C) give evidence for the claim that Sontag is Arbus’ harshest critic
D) illustrate how Sontag affected discussion surrounding Arbus’ work
E) support the idea that Arbus’ work does not fit in any specific documentary tradition
4. The author of the passage would most likely agree with which of the following statements about Arbus’ photographs?
A) They exemplified the contradictions inherent in the American tradition of documentary photography.
B) Their inclusion in Szarkowski’s 1967 group show accounts for much of the attention received by that exhibition.
C) They adhered to the norms established by the European tradition of documentary photography in many ways.
D) They were representative of the practice of documentary photography in American in the 1960s.
E) They were an essential part of a larger global project to reform the practice of documentary photography.
The positioning of Diane Arbus as a documentary photographer stems from the two exhibits that made her reputation, both curated by John Szarkowski: the group show New Documents in 1967 claimed to show documentary photography’s new direction, which Szarkowski said aimed “not to reform life, but to know it”, and Diane Arbus, the posthumous one-woman show five years later, which turned her into an icon. Even as Szarkowski identified Arbus’ work with the documentary tradition, both the American reformist line and the European taxonomic line represented by August Sanders (who came to be known in the United States in the 1960s), he also indicated the ways in which her work did not fit. If the documentary tradition displayed a consistent style of clarity and directness toward reality, it also displayed in the American tradition a particular emphasis on human suffering and a blend of realism and emotional charge, which was meant, in the words of Roy Stryker, the director of the Farm Security Administration, which sponsored the great documentary photography of the Depression era, to “incite change” by mobilizing sympathy. These two documentary modes—that of “knowing” and that of “reforming”—were tangling and untangling in the 1960s. For instance Walker Evans, who made his name with the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s, delivered his important lecture on “lyric documentary at Yale in 1964 in which he eschewed the social reform agenda; in 1966, the year before New Documents, the Farm Security Administration spirit had been revived by Cornell Capa’s exhibition The Concerned Photographer, and its similarly titled catalog, and the documentary practices it celebrated made for some of the most arresting images and photo-essays of the Vietnam War.
That Arbus fulfilled the realist impulse of the documentary tradition could hardly be more obvious, whatever her subject matter. But documentary stuck to Arbus through the powerful intervention not only of Szarkowski but also of Susan Sontag, Arbus first and still most influential critic. Sontag’s essay on the 1972 exhibit, which launched her inquiry into the medium of photography, is still routinely cited in reviews and scholarship on Arbus’ work. Sontag framed the problem of Arbus’s photographs within the documentary tradition following Szarkowski, and defined her work as a misappropriation of its form. Sontag claimed that Arbus photographed and collected other people’s pain but offered no “compassionate purpose” to the viewer. In these terms, Arbus lacked empathy and the photographs offered a “self-willed test of hardness,” one that inured the viewer to ugliness and pain. Sontag attached Arbus to one version of the documentary tradition, the US reformist agenda, and found Arbus’ ability to mobilize sentiment not only deficient but also corrosive of sympathetic sensibilities more broadly.
1. The passage suggests that the photographs of August Sanders were
A) an important influence on Diane Arbus’ work
B) likely viewed in Europe as misappropriating the documentary form
C) probably not familiar to most viewers of Arbus’ work
D) included in exhibits that were curated by Szarkowski
E) not intended to elicit sympathy from viewers
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