1. History of Photography
Hello everyone!
So today we’re going to learn a little it about photography.
Ask any or both of these questions:
Ask students- How many of you know what photography is? Can you describe it to me?
Ask students- Why is photography important?
Great answers! So this lesson is called History of Photography. HISTORY is story telling about what happens and why it is important. PHOTOGRAPHY is about pictures and how we make them. So the History of Photography is stories about what happens when people take pictures and why it is important. The people who take the pictures are called PHOTOGRAPHERS. The pictures can also be called PHOTOGRAPHS or PHOTOS. Photographers take photographs using a CAMERA.
On this slide we see two examples of important photographs in history. We will learn about how a basic camera works, some history about photography, some famous photographers, and important types of photography.

2. Mechanics of the Camera
How Cameras Work
Mechanics of the Camera
HOW CAMERAS WORK
Mechanics of the Camera
First let’s think about a couple of questions and talk about how a camera works. (Ask students to answer the following questions.)
What does a camera do? (makes a copy of an image)
How did people keep records of people or events before the camera? (painting, drawing, etching).
A camera is a light tight box that lets the light around an object you are focusing on to enter through a very small hole. That light goes to the back of the inside of the box and projects the image onto it, like a projector showing something on a SMART board. If there is a material that has chemicals on it that makes it sensitive to light inside the box, that material changes when light hits it. The photographer has to take out material and clean it to get some of the chemicals off to reveal the picture. It’s like magic.
The most important parts of a camera to remember are: a light-tight box, a hole, and a light sensitive surface to hold the image. This surface can be light sensitive photo paper coated with special chemicals, film, or a CPU (central processing unit found in digital cameras)

3. Intérieru d’un Cabinet Curiosité, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre, 1837
How Cameras Work
Intérieru d’un Cabinet Curiosité, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre, 1837
HOW CAMERAS WORK
Intérieru d’un Cabinet Curiosité, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre, 1837, daguerreotype, Collection Société Francaise de Photographie
When the camera obscura was first invented, it could only show an image. You couldn’t save or print it out. People worked to get an image that would keep the image on the paper.
Then a man with the last name of DAGUERRE made a photo of his artist studio that was clear. You can see his photo here. He called this photograph a DAGUERREOTYPE.
Is this image as good as photographs you’ve seen?

4. Example of a Cyanotype by Anna Atkins
Making Pictures
The word photography means drawing with light. Here we see a cyanotype by Anna Atkins. Atkins made these prints around 1840 and she used her images to illustrate a book on plants (botany)
To create a cyanotype, she placed leaves and other natural objects on light sensitive paper and exposed it to the sun. Then she removed the objects and washed the paper. Where the objects blocked the sun appears lighter and the areas exposed to the sun got darker.
This is the project we will be doing today!
Example of a Cyanotype by Anna Atkins

5. Portraiture Family Portrait, James Van Der Zee, 1928
Self-portrait, James Van Der Zee, 1915
PORTRAITURE
Self-portrait, James Van Der Zee, 1915, photograph
James Van Der Zee holding a newspaper with World War I headlines
Family Portrait, James Van Der Zee, 1928, photograph
PORTRAITS are a popular subject matter for painters and photographers.
AsWhat do PORTRAITS usually do? (Depict a specific person or group of people, describes the subject’s lifestyle, history, or personality)
James Van Der Zee was best known for his many portraits taken in New York City’s Harlem. That is a picture of him on the left. It’s titled Self-Portrait.
Ask students- Does anyone remember what a SELF–Portrait is? (a picture one does of oneself)
These photographs are what we typically think of when we see portraits.
A few more questions you can ask students-
What do these photos show?
Do you think you may see photos like these in other parts of the world?
How could they be different in other parts of the world?

6. Portraiture Michael Jackson, Annie Leibovitz
Annie Leibovitz, Robert Mapplethorpe
PORTRAITURE
Annie Leibovitz, Robert Mapplethorpe, date, photograph
Michael Jackson, Annie Leibovitz, date, photograph
Today, photographers often use their imagination and be more creative in creating portraits. They don’t just take pictures of people sitting down or even looking right at the camera. They can pose them in different ways.
Quote by Annie Leibovitz - “When I say I want to photograph someone, what it really means is that I’d like to know them.”
Ask students- What do you think you may know about the subject of Ms. Leibovitz’s portrait just by looking at the portrait on the right? (Michael Jackson was considered the King of Pop Music- his clothing implies something regal. He was also actually very shy which maybe why she had him not looking at the camera. Also, he wrote a song ”Man In The Mirror” so perhaps that’s why she had him stand in front of a mirror.)
Ask students- If Annie Leibovitz were to take your portrait what would you tell her about how you want to look in the photo? What would you include in your photo and why?

7. Anne Hathaway, Annie Leibovitz, 2012
Portraiture
A Wedding Dress modeled by Helen Lee Worthington, Baron Adolf de Meyer, 1920
PORTRAITURE
A Wedding Dress modeled by Helen Lee Worthington, Baron Adolf de Meyer, 1920, photograph, American Vogue
Anne Hathaway, Annie Leibovitz, 2012, photograph, American Vogue
Here are two fashion portraits. The one on the right was taken by Annie Leibovitz, 92 years after the one on the left by Baron Adolf de Meyer.
Ask students- How are they different? How are they similar? Do you like one better than the other? Why? Would you change anything?
Anne Hathaway, Annie Leibovitz, 2012

8. The Terminal, Alfred Stieglitz, 1893
Pictorialism and Landscapes
The Terminal, Alfred Stieglitz, 1893
PICTORIALISM AND LANDSCAPES
The Terminal, Alfred Stieglitz, 1893, photograph
At first, the camera was used more to record people and things that happened. Then photographers wanted people to think of their work as art, like paintings and drawings. But how can photography become art if the machine does all the work, right? Well think of it this way, it is the photographer who has to choose what to shoot and how to shoot it. The camera just records what the photographer chooses to show. The kinds of choices the photographer makes is what makes photography art.
In the early 1800’s, people started thinking of photography as art. A new way of creating pictures started happening. They called it PICTORIALISM.
Do you think someone should feel something when looking at a photograph? Why? What does the photo on this slide make you feel?
One of the FIRST successful pictorialist photographers was ALFRED STIEGLITZ (1864 – 1946). And this is his photo. His goal was for everyone to think of photography as art.

9. Moon and Half Dome, Yosemite, Ansel Adams, 1960
Pictorialism and Landscapes
PICTORIALISM AND LANDSCAPES
Moon and Half Dome, Yosemite, Ansel Adams, 1960, photograph
LANDSCAPES are another popular subject for photographers to take photos of. One of the most famous landscape photographers is ANSEL ADAMS. Ansel Adams was very good at taking pictures of nature.
He was a conservationist, loved to climb mountains and loved the wilderness.
What is a conservationist?
How do you think his photography show his love for nature? (He was making people aware of the beautiful places that they might not know about, show endangered areas, only focused on nature)
Adams planned for weeks or months to plan trips at the best time of year at the best time of day to take the best photograph he could. He carried heavy cameras into the wilderness and would wait for a very long time till the light was just right. Once the light was gone, which might just be 5 minutes, he was done for the day.
Many of his photos are black and white, why do you think he did that? (Perhaps to emphasize the texture seen in nature)

10. Climbing up on the machinery to replace bobbins, Lewis Hine
Documentary Photography and Photojournalism
Climbing up on the machinery to replace bobbins, Lewis Hine
DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY AND PHOTOJOURNALISM
Climbing up on the machinery to replace bobbins, Lewis Hine, date unknown, photograph, Library of Congress, Washington, DC
Did you know that photos can tell stories without words? Without even having to read anything, a photograph can tell people about what’s going in. DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY or PHOTOJOUNALISM is photography that informs people about things they might not know about.
Lewis Hine is one of the first to be successful with this kind of photography. He started as a schoolteacher who took on the responsibility to teach photography at his school. He didn’t know how to use a camera but he learned and then taught his students.
In 1908 he started working for the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC) as an investigative photographer to help outlaw child labor. He felt he changed his “educational efforts from the classroom to the world”.
Hine was very good at blending in and making children feel comfortable so he could take their pictures and show the problems and how child labor is.
Ask students- Do you think this is a good use of photography? What things happening today should be photographed in this way?

11. Breaker boys at Pennsylvania coal mine, Lewis Hine
Documentary Photography and Photojournalism
Breaker boys at Pennsylvania coal mine, Lewis Hine
DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY AND PHOTOJOURNALISM
Breaker boys at Pennsylvania coal mine, Lewis Hine, date unknown, photograph, Library of Congress, Washington DC
Many Americans saw Hine’s photos and many believed something had to be done to protect child workers.
Ask students-
What do you think happened after so many people saw the conditions that children had to work under?
How does this photo make you feel? What story is it telling?

12. Migrant Mother, Nipoma California, Dorothea Lange, 1936
Documentary Photography and Photojournalism
DOCUMENTARY PHOTOGRAPHY AND PHOTOJOURNALISM
Migrant Mother, Nipoma California, Dorothea Lange, 1936, photograph- gelatin silver print, The Oakland Museum of California
- Dorthea Lange was another famous photojournalist. Her photo of the Migrant Mother was taken during the Great Depression when many Americans were without jobs, homes and very very little money.
Ask students-
What kind of story is being told with this photo?
What do we know about these people by just looking at this photo?

13. Modernist Photography
Rayograph, Man Ray, 1921
Modernist Photography
Tears, Man Ray, Man Ray, 1930
MODERNIST PHOTOGRAPHY
Tears, Man Ray, Man Ray, 1930, photograph
Rayograph, Man Ray, 1921, gelatin silver print
As time passed and more people started learning photography, experimenting with different ways became popular. Beginning in the 1920’s photographers began creating works of art that showed, extreme close-ups, unusual angles, collages and camera-less photography. They paid attention to form, light and perspective.
MAN RAY was an American artist. He was a painter who used photography to help his painting but became more interested in photography. His work is considered part of MODERNIST PHOTOGRAPHY because many of his photos shows how much he liked to experiment. He started placing objects directly on the photo paper instead of using a camera. He called these Rayographs.
Look at the Rayograph in this slide.
Ask students- Does it look flat to you compared to the photograph of the eye? (yes)
Ask students- What objects do you see? (comb, fabric, nail file)

14. Miss and Misses (Battina and Fay), William Wegman, 1995
Modernist Photography
MODERNIST PHOTOGRAPHY
Miss and Misses (Battina and Fay), William Wegman, 1995, photograph
Another creative way to arrange the subjects in a photo is to choose different subjects or objects and change them in some way. WILLIAM WEGMAN used photography to create illusions.
Ask students- Have you seen any of his photographs? They typically include his family of Weimaraner dogs.
Wegman’s first dog was named Man Ray after the famous Modern photographer. The dogs became part of his work when he discovered that Man Ray calmed down when placed in front of the camera.
Ask students- What is your opinion about Wegman’s style of photography? Would you use any other animal?

15. Photographic Collage by David Hockney
Terrace with Shadows, 1985, photographic collage, 78 x 111 in, collection of the artist
People have become more creative and experimental with their photography. Here’s an example of a photo collage by David Hockney.
Photography can be a scientific tool, a way to create art, or a way to document the world around us.
What do you think is the most important use of photography?