PHOTOGRAPHY, CITY LIFE, and HOW THE OTHER HALF LIVES

PHOTOGRAPHY, CITY LIFE, and HOW THE OTHER HALF LIVES

Jacob August Riis (May 3, 1849 - May 26, 1914), a Danish-American muckraker journalist, photographer, and social reformer, was born in Ribe, Denmark. He is known for his dedication to using his photographic and journalistic talents to help the less fortunate in New York City, which was the subject of most of his prolific writings and photographic essays. As one of the first photographers to use flash, he is considered a pioneer in photography.

How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York (1890) was a pioneering work Riis, documenting the squalid living conditions in New York City slums in the 1880s.

During the 1880's upper and middle class society was unaware of the dangerous conditions in the slums among the poor immigrants. Jacob Riis, as an immigrant himself who could not originally find work, hoped to expose the squalor of the 19th century Lower East Side neighborhood in Manhattan. After a successful career as a police reporter he decided to publish a photojournal documenting these conditions using graphic descriptions, sketches, photographs, and statistics. Riis blamed apathy on the part of those with money on the condition of the New York slums and assumed that as people were made more aware of these conditions they would be more apt to helping eradicate them.

Keep in mind that photography was a staged enterprise until this time. Due to the recent invention of flash photography, Riis was able to capture the unlit areas of tenements, which helped him expose the wretched working and living conditions. This unveiled a new perspective of the nightlife in the dark slums that were often not even lit by streetlight, much less seen by the average New Yorker. The harsh white light from magnesium flash powder caused a look of shock to register on the faces of those photographed and came to stand for candid and objective photography.

1. Questions on reading:

· What country was Riis born in?

· What year was How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York published?

· What is a muckraker journalist?

§ A social reformer?

· Where are the photographs in the book taken?

· What photographic invention allowed Riis to take these candid photos?

2. Riis’ Photographs….
What do you think of his photos? Do you think he achieved the goals he laid out in the introduction to How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York (1890)?

View the photographs:

1. Photo 1

What can you learn about life in the 1880s and 90s from this photograph?