Susan Sontag Photograph

"Any photograph has multiple meanings; indeed, to see something in the form of a photograph is to encounter a potential object of fascination" (23).

Questions for 2/16

1. What do the photos mean to Eggleston? Who can really say what the pictures to mean to Eggleston but Eggleston himself?  If I had to guess I would say that the things he took pictures of he thought were important to document; they could have been important to him in some way, or important for future generations to know about.


2. What do they mean to you? To mean they represent the simplicity of life and childhood in some cases.  They had to be important to someone for them to be taken, but they also show the viewer that life isn't always about big cars and diamonds.

3. What does it mean to be a viewer of Eggleston's photos? (What does it mean to view something that you know has a personal meaning to someone else, but not know what exactly that meaning is?) It means that the photos can be interpreted by you no matter what the photographer was intending. Everything means something to someone else; we don't all see things differently. If we knew what Eggleston was thinking or feeling, then we wouldn't be able to interpret the photos for ourselves.

4. What makes these photos ART and not just snapshots? (why should we care?) These photos are ART because they mean something to someone. Someone put thought into what would make the photo a good picture and thought it would be important to show to others. 

New Thesis Statement

In William Eggleston's Guide, the importance of simplicity in life is portrayed throughout the book with the use of the pictures he chooses; these photographs also lead the viewer into thinking about the history of photography as an art form in the 1970's, and Eggleston as a photographer.

3 Thesis Statements

1.  In William Eggleston's Guide, the message of the importance of simplicity in life is portrayed throughout with the use of the pictures Eggleston has chosen; these photographs also lead the viewer into thinking about the social and cultural concerns of that time.

2. Photographs are appreciated differently by every viewer, and even by the photographer; Susan Sontag supports this by saying "Any photograph has multiple meanings; indeed , to see something in the form of a photograph is to encounter a potential object of fascination" (23).

3. By going through a book of photographs, such as William Eggleston's Guide, many lessons can be learned, especially that of simplicity; however, different people experience photographs in different ways and obtain different feelings from them.

Joel Meyerowitz

Here is one of his pictures:

Joel Meyerowitz was born in 1938 in the Bronx, New York City.  He is a street photographer.  He started taking photographs in color in 1962.  He was among the group of photographs to begin shooting exclusively in color.  He mainly takes pictures of places and people.  Meyerowitz graduated from Ohio State Univeristy in 1959 with a degree in painting and medical illustration.  He is the author of sixteen books.