Transcript Jacob Riis
Jacob Riis (1849-1914) COM 241 Photography I Documentary photos • Reflect a humanitarian point of view – Usually focus on people – Capture a way of life • Realistic – Meant to represent fact – Accurate and truthful Jacob Riis • (pronounced reese) • “America’s first photojournalist” • Born in Denmark, immigrated to U.S. when he was 21 • Lived in one of police-run poor houses in NYC • Eventually got a job as a crime reporter for New York Tribune • Wrote a series of articles on living conditions on Lower East Side of NY – No one took seriously • Decided to document with photographs • One of first photographers to use flash • “How the Other Half Lives” in 1890 • As result of his photos, city closed police-run poor houses Bottle Alley, Mulberry Road Jacob Riis Bandit's Roost, 59 1/2 Mulberry Street c. 1888 Jacob Riis Mullen's Alley, Cherry Hill c. 1888 Old house on a Bleecker Street back lot, between Mercer and Greene Street Typical tenement fire-escape serving as an extension of the flat: Allen Street Jersey Street tenements Home of an Italian Rag Picker on Jersey Street. c. 1888 Police station lodgers, West 47 Street, early 1890s Men's Lodging Room in the West 47th Street Station c. 1892 Police station lodgers waiting to be let out c. 1892 Police station lodgers, Madison Street Bunks in a sevent-cent lodging-house, Pell Street Police station lodgers, West 47 Street, early 1890s "Knee-pants" at forty-five cents a dozen--a Ludlow Street sweater's shop Twelve-year-old boy (who had sworn he was sixteen) pulling threads in a sweat shop, about 1889 Bohemian cigarmakers at work in their tenement Girl and a baby on a doorstep Fighting tuberculosis on the roof. Bottle Alley, Mulberry Bend The man slept in this cellar for four years, about 1890 In poverty Gap, West 28 Street: an English coal-heaver's home Street Arabs in Sleeping Quarters [church corner] Street Arabs in sleeping quarters [areaway, Mulberry St.] Getting ready for supper in the newsboys' lodging-house A flat in the pauper barracks, West 38 St., with all its furniture A blind beggar stands in the middle of a street and begs for someone to buy one of his pencils. Police Station Lodger, A Plank for a Bed c. 1890 Street Arabs in night quarters On the roof of the Barracks