In replying to David Hume Kennerly's outrage at the cropping of his photo, Frank DeMaria's response for Newsweek sounded more like an unprofessional attack than a dissemination of ideas and information. However, with that being said, my initial impressions of the photo were not of anything "sinister" or "evil" as Kennerly suggested.
Though cropped, the Newsweek photo is clearly set in someone's home with the granite topped cabinets and casual accesories in the background. It is also a somewhat social setting with at least one additional person that we see to the left. If it weren't for Kennerly's editorial, I would not have made any connection to Cheney being a butcher.
In debating whether Kennerly has a right to be upset that his photo was taken out of the intended context, consider for a moment the original photo with Cheney and his family. If the Cheney family knew that Kennerly was shooting pictures, the original shot was already somewhat staged. This is a practice well known to the public. If Kennerly's outrage is because Newsweek did not use the photo the way he expected it to be used, which was to show Cheney in a positive, family oriented setting, I can understand Kennerly being upset, but it doesn't seem to be a breach of ethics. If I sell an item that I made to a customer, I cannot get upset when the customer takes it apart and uses the pieces separately, simply because it has my name on it and I intended a different use for the item.
This may be an oversimplification, but Kennerly's photo was not significantly changed or airbrushed, it was cropped and I would imagine that cropping is done all the time when there are space requirements. An image that focuses on one subject from a photo does not seem to cross any major ethical lines. The cropped photo certainly does not seem to reflect some egregious opinion that "embarrassed and humiliated" him, as Kennerly stated.
Former vice president Cheney, in a starched shirt and blazer, cutting on white china in an expensively appointed kichen, does not come close to representing a butcher. Cropping the photo does not seem to change the context of the picture, it is only the words of the article that do this. If in the end, this picture was used to illustrate a point or to grab the reader's attention, in my opinion, Newsweek failed on both accounts.
http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/17/essay-9/
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1 comment:
Chanda, I agree with what you have to say. I think Newsweek had a right to use the picture Kennerly had taken as they so wish as the picture, regardless of who took it, is Newsweek's rightful property. As you stated I cannot sell an item to someone and dictate to them how to use it. Obviously the question of right and wrong is what we are looking at. I believe Newsweek is right in publishing the picture with the attached story, the wrong is the violation of Kennerly's trust. Kennerly's annoyance I think stems from personal guilt, Cheney trusted Kennerly to take pictures and no doubt there would have been a good rapport between both men during the photo shoot, Cheney’s sentiments towards Kennerly most likely changed after Newsweek ran their story.
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