Summary:

In this series of black-and-white photographs, Hannah Wilke poses half-naked for the camera, mimicking the postures of female celebrities and models in magazines and advertisements. She is mockingly flirtatious in some images, playfully wearing a man’s tie, tousling her hair, smiling suggestively with her lips parted. In other images, her expression is cold and distant, as the viewer gazes at the sensuous curves of her neck, back, and breasts.

But there is more. Wilke has also stuck tiny chewing gum sculptures of vulvas to her body. These sculptures simultaneously confront and repel the viewer. The vulvas explicitly confront the viewer about their sexual thoughts and desires as they view photographs of a woman’s body. And the vulvas sprout from her face, back, and chest like warty or diseased growths, and causing the viewer to step back in revulsion, thus breaking their lascivious gaze.

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Following the 9-11 terrorist attacks, approximately 20 New York University medical students volunteered to work with the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of the City of New York (OCME) attached to the NYU School of Medicine to sort, catalogue and identify human remains recovered at Ground Zero. On September 11, Barry Goldstein, Adjunct Professor of Humanism in Medicine at NYU, was to begin teaching a course on aspects of photography to medical students. After 9-11, Goldstein decided to photograph and interview the volunteer medical students in order to document their individual experiences and memories of the events of September 11 and their personal reflections of working with the dead.

Photographed with a simple black background in the "scrubs" they wore while working in the morgue, and with a personal "prop" of their choosing, the colour portraits are intensely sorrowful and candid. Goldstein, who is an experienced portrait photographer, observed that "for reasons I still find unclear, these students were surprisingly adept at absenting themselves from the entire process of picture taking. As a result, the masks that we generally put on for the world when faced with a camera were absent." Accompanying each student's image is an excerpt from his/her interview about memories of working in the morgue and the meaning of that work.

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This powerful book of black and white photographs contains four sections labeled: I. The End of Manual Labor, 1986-, II. Diverse Images 1974-87, III. Famine in the Sahel, 1984-85, and IV. Latin America, 1977-84. In addition, photographs accompany the prose-poetry opening essay, "Salgado, 17 Times," by Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano and the concluding essay, "The Lyric Documentarian," by former New York Times picture editor Fred Ritchin. This oversize book concludes with a list of captions for the photographs and a detailed two-page biography of Salgado. Essentially the photographs cover Salgado’s impressive work from 1974-89.

Every image is of a person or people. Many are suffering, many are starving, grieving, keening, dying, displaced. Many are children. Many are laboring under impossibly harsh conditions such as the teeming, mud-coated manual laborers of the Brazilian Serra Pelada gold mine. An Ethiopian father anoints the corpse of his famine starved, skin and bone child with oil. An old man, squinting in the sun, leans over to touch the arm of an equally thin and weak man in a Sudanese refugee camp. Rarely, the people are smiling or celebrating.

The photographs are global: Angola, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Brazil, Chad, Cuba, Ecuador, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Mali, Mexico, Portugal, Sudan, Thailand, and more. As Galeano notes, "This much is certain: it would be difficult to look at these figures and remain unaffected. I cannot imagine anyone shrugging his shoulder, turning away unseeing, and sauntering off, whistling." (p. 7) [156 pp.]

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This is an exhibition catalogue for a show of 16 photographers who documented major topics in health over the last century. Carol Squiers, curator of the show, provides ten essays, amply illustrated by photos, on critical topics such as child labor, domestic violence, environmental pollution, AIDS, veterans of war, and aging. Some 80 per cent of the images treat American subjects.

Lewis Wickes Hine's photographs of child labor are dramatic and disturbing; these document children in coal mines, cotton mills, glass works, etc. in the first part of the 20th century. The Farm Security Administration sponsored photographers (including Dorothea Lange) to represent the New Deal Health Initiatives. Topics include farm labor, poverty in the South and Southwest, and inoculations. W. Eugene Smith created a photographic essay for Life magazine about Maude Callen, an African-American nurse-midwife in 1950s rural South Carolina.

Donna Ferrato documented domestic violence in the U.S. in powerful, personal shots, including a series of an actual attack. David T. Hanson created triptychs about environmental pollution: one panel shows a map of the area, a middle panel gives descriptive text, the last panel is an aerial shot in color. Eugene Richards spent time in the 1980s in Denver General's Emergency Room. Eleven black and white photos show the turmoil and drama.

Gideon Mendal documented HIV/AIDS in several African countries. Lori Grinker took photos of army veterans (some without hands) but also noncombatants harmed by war, including children. Ed Kashi presents images of aging Americans, rich and poor, urban and rural. Sebastião Salgado provides photos of vaccination in Africa and Asia.

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As the title denotes, each image of a person with AIDS is captioned with his or her own words and signature. Howard's juxtaposition of both images and words lends a special power and specific meaning to the collection: images are given a distinctive human voice, words a distinctive human face.

Each image tells a story, but the story is that of a singular life facing a singular death. Using a focused lens and realistic frame, Howard presents candid portraits of persons in ordinary surroundings engaged in daily activities. Light creates mood in this pictorial display of the entire range of human emotion.

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This collection of over ninety photographs and their stories celebrates an "unsung army of great healers," caregivers of persons with AIDS. Herself infected with the HIV virus, mother and AIDS activist Mary Fisher chronicles painful, private, and precious moments of interaction between patients, families, lovers, friends, and "professionals," in home, hospital, clinic, and other settings (a women’s prison on Riker’s Island, a homeless shelter in Boston, a nursery in West Palm Beach). Interspersed with the photographs and commentary are excerpts from Fisher’s letters and addresses including her show-stopping televised speech at the 1992 Republican National Convention.

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Art Myers is not only an art photographer but also a physician who specializes in preventive medicine and public health. Having experienced breast cancer in members of his own family, including his wife, he began to see the disease in a new light and undertook this photographic project to show that for a woman, the loss of part or all of her breast need not be a threat to her being.

In addition to the artistic nude photographs of thirteen different women from a variety of backgrounds there are meaningful personal vignettes and beautiful poetry by Maria Marrocchino. Some of the photographs show women with significant others. The women present their bodies and themselves with humor, sadness, vulnerability and honesty.

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Levin, a social documentary photographer, immersed herself with the Class of 2001 in the anatomy course at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. Her photographs of cadavers, students and instructors are prefaced by a foreword by physician-writer Abraham Verghese. He describes the rite of passage of anatomical dissection: "The living studying the dead. The dead instructing the living." (p. 9)

Interspersed with the full-color images are journal entries by 11 medical students and several artistic anatomic illustrations by 3 of the students. The journal entries and photographs are organized temporally, from the introduction to the dissection lab to the final exam and student-organized memorial service. The end of the book includes the interests and brief biographies of the 11 students and a final dedication by Levin of the book to those who donated their bodies: "I have never before witnessed a gift that is honored, respected, and consumed so completely."

The photographs are not for the squeamish. For example, the double amputee pelvis prosection on page 102, or the multiple images of flayed skin, bits and pieces, or limbs tied to supports provide an insider's view of an anatomy course. Many of the images show the living in motion: translucent images of students in time-lapse swirl near the static cadavers. Other images conjure the once-upon-a-time personhood of the dead: pink fingernail polish on a female cadaver or a heart palmed by a student. The intensity of the student experience is well documented, as is the relaxed atmosphere that inevitably develops as students become accustomed to the experience of dissection.

The student journal entries are sensitive and thoughtful. Students comment on the intersections of daily living, home life, and their own bodies and bodily functions with what they are learning in the classroom. Particular discomfort regarding certain dissections, such as the pelvic region, are acknowledged. Even though students note growing immunity to the dissection experience, such comments reflect insight into professionalism and defense systems. Gallows humor and uneasiness with such humor is explored by Rebecca (p 62) after she sings "New York, New York" to the roomful of cadavers. Forensic clues about the cause of death for a particular cadaver renew the sense for students that this was once a living, feeling person.

The intense, long hours required for understanding and memorizing the material are clearly evident, but ultimately, these students realize they are given a truly special opportunity: "I began to love learning the material just for the sake of learning. Anatomy no longer felt like a burden, but rather a gift." (David, p. 119) Relationships explored include those of student with cadaver (particularly respect/disrespect, ownership and protection), life with death, and those who have had the experience of dissection with those who never will.

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Summary:

Levin, a social documentary photographer, immersed herself with the Class of 2001 in the anatomy course at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. Her photographs of cadavers, students and instructors are prefaced by a foreword by physician-writer Abraham Verghese. He describes the rite of passage of anatomical dissection: "The living studying the dead. The dead instructing the living." (p. 9)

Interspersed with the full-color images are journal entries by 11 medical students and several artistic anatomic illustrations by 3 of the students. The journal entries and photographs are organized temporally, from the introduction to the dissection lab to the final exam and student-organized memorial service. The end of the book includes the interests and brief biographies of the 11 students and a final dedication by Levin of the book to those who donated their bodies: "I have never before witnessed a gift that is honored, respected, and consumed so completely."

The photographs are not for the squeamish. For example, the double amputee pelvis prosection on page 102, or the multiple images of flayed skin, bits and pieces, or limbs tied to supports provide an insider’s view of an anatomy course. Many of the images show the living in motion: translucent images of students in time-lapse swirl near the static cadavers. Other images conjure the once-upon-a-time personhood of the dead: pink fingernail polish on a female cadaver or a heart palmed by a student. The intensity of the student experience is well documented, as is the relaxed atmosphere that inevitably develops as students become accustomed to the experience of dissection.

The student journal entries are sensitive and thoughtful. Students comment on the intersections of daily living, home life, and their own bodies and bodily functions with what they are learning in the classroom. Particular discomfort regarding certain dissections, such as the pelvic region, are acknowledged. Even though students note growing immunity to the dissection experience, such comments reflect insight into professionalism and defense systems. Gallows humor and uneasiness with such humor is explored by Rebecca (p 62) after she sings "New York, New York" to the roomful of cadavers. Forensic clues about the cause of death for a particular cadaver renew the sense for students that this was once a living, feeling person.

The intense, long hours required for understanding and memorizing the material are clearly evident, but ultimately, these students realize they are given a truly special opportunity: "I began to love learning the material just for the sake of learning. Anatomy no longer felt like a burden, but rather a gift." (David, p. 119) Relationships explored include those of student with cadaver (particularly respect/disrespect, ownership and protection), life with death, and those who have had the experience of dissection with those who never will.

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Summary:

This book is about fifteen people with AIDS whose words and images record what is happening to their bodies and spirits as they confront the reality and contemplate the mystery of certain death. Nicholas and Bebe Nixon set out to describe honestly and compassionately what it is to have AIDS; what it does to families and friends; why it is the most devastating social and medical issue of our time.

The photographs are characteristic of Nixon’s "serial portraits"--stark and formal close-ups or shallow-focused medium shots of immobile subjects taken at intervals of weeks and months with an 8 x 10 view camera. They are accompanied by comments culled from subjects’ conversations and letters by Bebe Nixon, a science journalist.

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