‘A picture is worth a thousand words.’ This is the old cliché. The thing about clichés, however, is that they are often true. Photography is an extremely powerful medium for communication for so many reasons. It does not require language; any human from any culture with any level of education can absorb the emotion or beauty of ink on a page or pixels on screen. The gratification is instant; there is no need to read a story or listen to an interview. If you see a photograph of a soldier laying dead on the ground with his mother crying over his lifeless body, the impact is immediate and all encompassing. Photographs also have tremendous potential to influence public opinion and tell stories of entire eras, sometimes even serving as the record of generations.
There are so many examples of photographs changing the world or signifying hugely complicated situations and phenomenon. Several examples come to mind: the U.S. soldier kissing a woman in dramatic fashion after returning home from World War II, Malcolm X staring out of his window with rifle in hand, the image of Jeffry Miller laying dead after the protest gone wrong at Kent State. These are only a few examples, but these alone show the immense ability of photographs to serve as bookmarks for history.
On a personal level for me, photography is the medium that I choose to express myself and record my own memories. There are times when I am down or missing something or someone and decide to flip through my old photo albums or gaze longingly at prints of far away places with long lost companions. I feel as though if I take as many photos as possible through all my adventures, relationships and day to day routines that when I am older I will have the ability to relive my past experiences as well as show others the many amazing (to me) places and people that have made me who I am. In essence, a photograph is a memory, a way to escape and remember.
These are just a few of my favorite photos or photos that I consider to be extremely significant.
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