photo-essay

also n.
A series of photographs that conveys a story, usually accompanied by a written text and published as a book or special feature in a periodical.

photo-essayist pho'to-es'say·ist n.

Occasionally, photographers have captured a single event in sequential form: for example, Paul Nadar's photographs of the interview between the centenarian chemist Chevreul and Félix Nadar (1886), Brassaï's A Man Dies in the Street, Boulevard de la Glacière (1932), and Arthur Codfod's pictures of the Hindenburg disaster (1937). But the term photo-essay implies something more extended, structured, and multifaceted: the exploration by one (usually) or more photographers of an issue, place, or social situation in a more or less leisurely manner that reveals its character and dynamics. How and by whom the story is written up has varied, and often caused friction between photographer and editor.

The classic era of the photo-essay lasted from the 1920s to the 1960s, with the rise of the mass-circulation illustrated press. Subjects ranged from sport and travel to war, politics, and social documentary. Over the same period, layouts evolved from symmetrical arrangements of discretely captioned pictures to much more dynamic placement and sizing of photographs and combinations of image and text. Papers like the Berliner illustrirte Zeitung, the Münchener illustrierte Presse, Vu, Regards, Life, and Picture Post were in the forefront, although journals like the Russian USSR in Construction, the Japanese Nippon, and wartime German Signal also reflected the trend. After 1945 the photo-essay experienced an Indian summer, with outstanding examples in Lilliput (Bill Brandt on Connemara, 1947), Fortune (Walker Evans on Chicago, 1947), Vogue (Walker Evans on ‘Faulkner's Mississippi’, 1948), and Paris Match (George Rodger on the Nuba, 1949; Henri Cartier-Bresson on Moscow, 1955). But the master of the mature photo-essay was W. Eugene Smith, whose essays Country Doctor (1948), Spanish Village (1951), and Death-Flow from a Pipe (on pollution at Minamata, 1972) appeared in Life. His relations with Life were notoriously difficult, however, and led to his resignation in 1955. At issue were fundamental questions like length, but above all whether the story itself would be structured by the photographer or by editors.

The decline of the major news magazines removed the economic basis for what was, by its nature, a slow-paced, costly, and usually unsensational branch of photojournalism. Since the late 20th century, work in the genre has been relegated to books and exhibitions, for which photographers usually have to find their own sponsorship. Although sponsorship from organizations like the Guggenheim and Hasselblad foundations may be available, usually few publishers and fewer galleries are prepared to put up serious funding (other than for certain members of famous-name agencies such as Magnum), so that a photographer must earn the cost of travel and equipment before even embarking on a necessarily uncertain project. The rewards are in the satisfaction of producing a sustained piece of work, outside the inherently ephemeral format of news journalism, which may attract critical attention and become a classic of its kind.

— Amanda Hopkinson/Robin Lenman

Bibliography

• Willumson, G. G., William Eugene Smith and the Photographic Essay (1991).
• Dewitz, B. v., and Lebeck, R., Kiosk: A History of Photojournalism 1839-1973 (2001)

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