March 25, 2004
The Photography of Walker Evans.
Blunt portraits of life in the Depression and some other stuff thrown in for good measure.
And his collaborative work with James Agee, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men is worth a read.
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I love Walker Evans. More to check out: this, this and this.
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All great links!
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James Agee's writing in Let Us is long and angry, as the write up in forks' second link mentions - and frustratingly focussed on Agee's own feelings rather than the lives of the people he studied (especially for those of us who find teh families he lived with much more interesting than his own angst). That said, as a work of literature it is incrediably powerful, and influential in modern ethnography. Anyone interested in following up on the story of the three families should definately read And Their Children After Them by Dale Maharidge and Michael Williamson. It not only follows the families' stories after Agee left them, but also gives their opinions of the events Agee write about (very different from how Agee understood them).