Through A Lens Darkly - Xiongyue Yu Journal Entry 1

 Through a Lens Darkly

Whether negro boys or girls, they undergo the process that is to find the image of himself or herself that is not imposed by other nations. More importantly, it’s not the stereotypes that have been existed long time ago. Thomas Allen Harris surprisingly found that many people couldn’t name an exact black photographer and this became part of reasons for the film. This film has shown in TIME magazine and indicates that it’s a deep, rich dive into the history of African American photography. Based on the information that I have collected, I have known that the filmmaker Thomas Allen Harris put two ideas into the film itself, one is to narrate the history of of African-American photography and the other one is the stories found in our family albums. As for the form of film, it also includes the third aspect, which is the way of representation that people how to overcome the difficulties that were set by otherfamily albums. And this film is inspired by photo-historian (and Co-Producer) Deborah Willis’ publication, Reflections in Black: A History of Black Photographers 1840 to the Present. In this book, he wanted more people to see that black people were actively involved in movements about education and emancipation.Therefore, it’s an opportunity to shed more glimpses on black photographers, entrepreneurs, artists, and also documentarians and photojournalists. As we all known, photography can be a witness of history, recording moments in visual mode, namely, the facts. Therefore, Harris chooses his personal story as the basic framework of the film. Through collecting photos and interviews with other families who are willing to share the photos in public, Harris’ own story is interweaved with them to form the film, evoking the pass memories about different communities, lifestyles and cultures. And I think this film can inform more people of the past time and educate them the real African-American life. And in the content, the file aims at not only the family itself, but also the family members. Whether in private or public photography, the way to mold the imagination of African-American life and presence of African-American life. And also, it’s to find more different ways to see African-American art. Invisibility is the keyword that highlights in the film for the black photographers. This one is also the connection to the black identity, which means that they are the neglected community in the family album of photographs. The history of photography of and by African-Americans as effectively comprising a kind of family album of the culture. Besides the hidden history of black photographers, there are other issues that have been expressed in the film like the work of LGBT artists and so on.

 


 

 

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