The Art of Biography

Using pictures to tell the story

It is said a picture is worth a thousand words. The picture could be paint on canvas or other mediums or light trapped on film. Whatever the method of creating the picture, the result is the same, the picture tells a story – a story crafted by the artist. In the process of creating the picture, the artist engages in a process of crafting the story through selection – what elements of the story are important enough to be included in the picture and what are not?

LBJ Hollywood picture

Eventually a picture can take on a life of its own. It represents one brief moment in time yet as time moves on the moment in the picture takes on greater significance for what it shows and does not show. Look for example at the WWII pictures of President Lyndon Baines Johnson in Robert Caro's The Years of Lyndon Johnson: Means of Ascent. ²⁴ Look in particular at the first picture in the picture inserts. On the surface this is a staged picture of a future President of the United States. He looks handsome. He is smoking a cigarette (this alone will stimulate discussion). But the picture looks too staged. He has a bit of a smirk as if he has a secret. What is the picture trying to hide? Upon investigation I learned that during World War II, while LBJ was touring shipyards up and down the West Coast of the United States, he engaged the services of a Hollywood photographer. With the photographs, LBJ wanted to ascertain which poses showcased him as someone to be trusted, revered, and lauded. ²⁵

At first glance at the initial photo, I see a handsome and confident man. However, as I continue to look at the first picture, knowing what I now know, this picture takes on a greater significance than LBJ had intended. To me, this picture highlights LBJ's facade -the slight smirk provides the clue to the man who would shake your hand and slap you on the back all while picking your pocket. At the time this picture was taken, the people of Texas were being told LBJ was off fighting for their country. In fact he was attending Hollywood movie screenings and movie star parties, as well as 'entertaining' Alice Glass, the mistress of one of his biggest patrons, Charles E. Marsh while his wife, Lady Bird, stayed at a hotel in Los Angeles and ran his congressional office. ²⁶ The picture takes on a whole new meaning once I know the backstory, the part I can not see but can intuit. With this picture, we can discuss our multiple faces – the one we wear for public and the private face. Using the picture allows us to have a much more interesting and influential discussion rather than just a superficial survey of the facts.

Migrant Mother

Next, look at Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother. This picture is also a staged portrait. At first glance this is a picture of an old, sad, poor woman. However, upon investigation, it is so much more. Dorothea Lange had been commissioned by the Resettlement Administration to document migratory farm labor. She was in Nipomo, CA in Feb/March of 1936 at the end of a month long trip. Lange saw a woman, Florence Owens Thompson, and knew she had to photograph her. Lange took six photos ²⁷ of Thompson and her children. These photos were submitted to the Resettlement Administration along with hundreds of others, but this one photo seemed to tell the whole story of what was happening in the nation. The struggle seen in the picture exemplified the struggle of all those who suffered during the Great Depression. We identify with the woman; her struggle is our struggle without ever knowing what the literal story is behind the photo, we 'know'. ²⁸ With this photo we can discuss the struggle and how we all have had to struggle in our own ways.

Elizabeth Eckford – Little Rock Nine

Will Counts' picture of Elizabeth Eckford, one of the Little Rock Nine, attempting to enter Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas while being verbally taunted by a mob of whites — most notably Hazel Bryan — instantly tells the story of segregation. ²⁹ This picture was absolutely not staged. Will Counts was a native of Little Rock at the time of desegregation. His pictures were his attempt to tell the real story of what he was witnessing. In this one picture we see the depth of the racial hatred yet the resoluteness of the African-Americans in seeking to exercise their basic constitutional rights. This picture is so provocative that it will evoke a reaction and stimulate discussion. I want my students to want to look deeper. ³⁰

The pictures and the discussions will lay the foundation and serve to stimulate their reading and writing about the subject in a picture.