I&P: Assignment 3, Rework

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[24May21] There is not a great deal of rework arising from the (I thought) very positive feedback.

There are 3 points raised that need a response:
Mrs. B's background role;
to what extent and when did inexpensive cameras give agency to the marginalised?; and
I should have included the Falklands War in my piece on photography in war, Exc 3.3.

Regarding the links provided in feedback,

1. https://www.jillgreenberg.com/gallery-2
I had not encountered Jill Greenberg before. Her animal portraits are strikingly clever, but I have no urge to emulate this or any other of her types of work.

2. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2018/sep/10/do-you-look-like-your-dog-canine-human-lookalikes-in-pictures
I find Gerrard Gethings project on dog/owner lookalikes less engaging as it relies mostly on haircuts and coloured backgrounds. Some of the other animal photographs on his site are less frivolous and bear some comparison to Goldberg.

3. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2002/feb/25/broadcasting.falklands
This is a fascinating piece on coverage of the Falklands War and brought back memories from 1982 (I was 27 at the time) of watching daily broadcasts by Ian McDonald from the MOD. In retrospect, the attention paid by the nation to those bulletins was comparable to the Boris + Scientists official reports in the early days of Covid. It was only later that we came to realise how little information we were being given while it was happening.

4. https://wellcomecollection.org/articles/XVqudxMAACEAxxLK
I was delighted to be associated, however faintly, with Jo Spence in the feedback,

The medical examination images that you included are honest and potent. They reminded me of Jo Spence’s work
Asg.3 feedback

Jo is one of my great photo-heros, as much for her strident personal politics as her photography. She co-authored a great little book with Richard Greenhill and Margaret Murray, a 1977, 96-page general introduction to practical photography. Even within that limited space and the editorial boundaries that must have been imposed by the publisher, they still manage to be quite political when it comes to roles and responsibilities in the craft. (It's also the only Jo Spence book I can afford.)

I attended an online, largely feminist symposium in October 2020 Let us now praise famous women . Patrizia Di Bello gave a lecture on Spence - I wrote to her afterwards volunteering to help with the Spence archive but did not receive a reply.

Greenhill, R., Murray, M. & Spence, J. (1977) Photography. London: Macdonald.