re: #95 goddamnedfrank

Since I’m probably the only one here with a graduate degree in photography let me just say this: Visually, Orthodox Jews are just begging to be imaged in black and white. Why? Because their very presence is, to most of modern society, a kind of walking optical anachronism. Which isn’t to say that they don’t “belong” in the present day but their look is just old. Awesome, badass in it’s own way and totally classy, but old. And black/white, it’s a very stark, classic look. Since silhouettes themselves are a classic B&W technique, because they’re already about the stripping away of as much shadow detail and information as possible down to a mostly binary, contrasty image, I can see why many trained photographers see Orthodox Jews and choose to shoot them in silhouette.

And because as I mentioned above it’s a very depersonalizing technique I can see why many photographers go to it when the individual identity of the subject isn’t the story.

This may totally shock you, but we are human beings, we have individual characteristics, names, hobbies, skills, we have loved ones and we are loved. We are not faceless black blob non entities.