Just when I thought that we had put the Turkish woman in red behind us, reader Megan has treated me to another mace in the face image – this one from Brazil.  Following and feeding on the women in red, it too has gone internet viral.

I really don’t want to get into the politics here.  So maybe I had better let  Victor Caivano the Associated Press photographer, who took the picture tell the story: “the woman, who appeared to be a normal, middle-class university student, was standing completely alone at around 11:20 p.m. yesterday on a deserted corner after the police had cleared the area. The protest was over, riots included.  Three riot officers approached the woman and told her to leave. When she resisted — the woman either questioned the order or insisted that she wasn’t doing anything wrong, she was pepper-sprayed. This policeman just didn’t think twice.”

OK.  So from the point of view of this blog the picture is interesting because it represents a microcosmic change or evolution of the Turkish woman in red meme.  The woman has changed.  The red dress is gone.  The menacing crowd is gone.  The attack is if anything more direct!  Hmm, so the meme of the woman in red no longer requires the woman in red?

Requires her to do what?  To evoke the emotion of empathy for the victim.  The act is vicious and unnecessary.  If you look at the other images from these demonstrations, you can even start to sympathize with the policemen – fright, reflex, the end of a long day?  The point is that it is mean and an over reaction.  Yes, it could be worse.  They could have shot her in the face.  But to me the excessive degree and essential meanness and dehumanization of the victim are the keys here.  To me the point of this picture is that we would be a lot better off if there were more projection of ourselves into other people’s shoes, more empathizing and understanding, less pepper spray.  I apologize if I appear to have gone too far off topic.  But the point is that this image is meant to evoke a powerful and strong reaction, and it certainly has done so in me.

We have discussed at considerable length the concept of memes or if you prefer the connotations of images.  The most obvious lesson in all of this is that we cannot escape our biology.  It’s all in our genes – with the wonderful paradoxical caveat that the closer you look towards identifying those genes, the more the very concept becomes fuzzy and the gene disappears.  Still we are certainly very complex, and our ability to relate with an image and to associate it with a reality is deeply imbedded in a intertwined network of biology, physics, chemist, neurology, and ultimately psychology. 

It is never-the-less not a contradiction or paradox to believe that we can understand ourselves and in the present case understand the meaning of photography.  The fact that we are using the very computer that we are trying to understand, namely our brains, presents no real obstacles.

So let’s consider a very simple question, namely, why we can relate to a black and white image as expressing reality, even though we see in color?  And I should say from the start that I am conjecturing here – although I am fairly certain that there is a huge body of scientific literature on this very topic.

You will remember the image of Albert Einstein in our discussion of memes and the curious question of why he is wearing his wife’s coat.  Is the picture in your mind as Albert Einstein, your meme, in color or in black and white?  We had no problem recognizing this black and white image of Einstein as Einstein.  Similarly we would have no problem recognizing a color picture of Einstein as Einstein.  It is even the case that if we were to Photoshop an Einstein picture with weird, say psychedelic, colors that we would still associate this image with our meme entitled “Albert Einstein.”  So we conclude that the essential information that codes our meme is structural and black and white.  Color is unnecessary and in the case of the weirdly colored image can be a bit distracting, perhaps requiring a few more fractions of a second to gain recognition.

So in a sense we can argue that black and white is capable of carrying all of the necessary form information.  You might even argue that it is the fundamental form and for that reason we see in a black and white photograph some kind of purity.  This, perhaps, arises from the way in which vision evolved.  At the very least color can be quite confounding.  Working with modern digital cameras gives you the binary option of shall I stay in black and white, thereby focusing on form, light, and contrast or shall I add the very profoundly dominant element of color.  With an intensely colored image it’s often quite difficult to get your mind to focus on anything else.

That said, our eyes can crave color.  And certainly color can provide a very beautiful and dominant component to a photograph.  This is perhaps illustrated by the fact that quite often when one is working on a black and white image, we have the sense that something is missing and we can add that something by miserly adding just a bit of color, the fine subtle shades of toning.  In this process one often has the sense that the image is “meant” to be toned sepia or green or blue.  Of course, that is a very subjective sense.

So in this small bit of conjecture, we perhaps have the roots of a theory of why black and white photography is so appealing.  We see it as an art form that is essentially pure and unconfounded by color.  We see that it codes all the information about forms to appeal to our societal memes, that is to take on meaning and emotion.

I was discussing the work of Narinder Nanu with a colleague, and he suggested that I should really take a look at the photographic work of Raghu Rai.  This proved to be excellent advice and a wonderful adventure.  There is a very unique quality and vision to Rai’s work.  He was born in 1942 and became a photographer in 1965.  He joined the staff of the New Delhi publication “The Statesman” in 1966.  Ten years later he became a freelance photographer and in 1977 became a protégé of Henri Cartier-Bresson, who appointed Rai to “Magnum Photos.”  Rai was also Director of Photography for “India Today,” from 1982-1992.  He has published several books, most famously “Reflections in Colour“ and “Reflections in Black and White.”

You can see some of Raghu Rai’s stunning work at Aicon Gallery on the web.  Probably his most famous image is that of an unknown child victim being buried after the Bhopal gas disaster.  In researching Rai’s images, I have found quite a few that I find wonderful and would call favorites.  The first is “The Day Before – Ayodhya, 6 Dec. 1992.”  The picture is perfect technically.  The density is exact, and the morning fog adds just a bit of mystery.  And then there is the subject matter, a sadhu giving an offering to a passerby and then, of course, there is the baboon.  It’s just so magical.  And then there is “Cloud Series 7, 2010.”  I have to say that I have never seen a picture quite like thisand never quite seen light like this, which divides a picture both horizontally and vertically into light and dark.  This truly speaks to a master’s vision.

It’s been an intense day at the office, and I have been looking for some peace and serenity.  And I am repeatedly drawn to a wonderful picture from Narinder Nanu of  AFP/Getty Images.  The picture was taken on June 7, 2013 and shows a Sikh devotee immersed in the holy water reservoir at the Golden Temple, the Harmandir Sahib or the abode of God.  In Amritsar, India this is the holiest of places for the Sikhs.

I pretty much like everything about this photograph starting with the subject matter.  There is no doubt what it is about, devotion and inner peace.  The colors are quite wonderful.  Just intense enough to indicate the steaminess of the day.  And in this context, the way in which the sky is washed out doesn’t bother me, which it usually does.  Here it adds a dreamy effect. The angle is really wonderful.  You don’t expect a picture like this to be taken from water level, but in doing so it really adds to the intimacy and creates the sense that the temple is floating.  The way that the devote’s face is lit from the side adds a tone of mystery and sharp intensity.  He is effectively illuminated both physically and spiritually by the light of the temple.  The way that the image of the temple reflects in undulating ripples is magnificent and adds a real sense of dynamic motion to the image.  Oh, and did I mention the perfect use of the golden rule of thirds?In my opinion, this is a great photograph!

Figure 1 – George Wallace Attempting to block integration at the University of Alabamaand being confronted by U.S. Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, fifty years ago today. From the Wikimediacommons and the archives of the LOC and in the public domain.

We have discussed at some length the iconic image of the Turkish woman in red, how she became a meme, and how she rapidly rose to worldwide internet status.  Well just as her memetic stature was starting to fade, we were greeted today by new images from Istanbul, these of riot police emptying Taksim Square in a blaze of tear gas and water cannon.

Well, even keeping away from the specifics of the politics, there’s a lot of interesting aspects to this.  The goal of the opposition is always to create memes to appeal to the common psyche.  The goal of those in power is what?  To try very hard not to create memes?  Or is it to create the meme of the iron fist?  Either way, historically this fails.  I vividly remember my political science teacher in college remarking that the only legitimate wielder of power in a society is the government, but each time they use that power against the citizenry they diminish it.

Images of today’s police offensive in Istanbul is a very recognizable meme. The oppression of lawful demonstrations in Turkey seems all too familiar to other squares and other crackdowns.  indeed, you can argue that we are watching the genesis or reinforcement of a meme.  We have seen this play before and ultimately we know how it will end.

And then, as if that is not enough, we have NBC reporter Richard Engel broadcasting live from Taksim Square wearing a gas mask.  What is the subliminal message of this –   that it has become unsafe to breath the very air that is our human birthright, or that repression has forced us to inhabit the dark subterranean places frequented by rats and moles?  At some level it is certainly that freedom of expression is not squashed, but ultimately triumphant.  I apologize if I am being melodramatic.  But the Engel image is so bizarre as to become surreal.  The meaning is complex and subtle.  But it is powerful stuff.

And finally, consider Turkish Woman in Red in the context of Figure 1.  This is an image from the United States Library of Congress and shows Alabama Governor George Wallace barring entry to the University of Alabama by African American students.  Here he is confronted by United States Attornery General Nicholas Katzenbach.  The image was taken fifty years ago today.

Figure 1 Abraham Lincoln’s first Inauguration, May 4, 1861. From the Wikimediacommons and in the public domain.

In my post on Friday we discussed the Turkish woman in red and how to a disturbing degree image memes represent stereotypes.  In a sense image memes are a form of shorthand.  And in regard to this shorthand the situation can get darker still. In effect the whole effect can spiral out of control in the mad rush to communicate faster and faster.

In another recent post we discussed our the development of the telegraph by Samuel F. B. Morse (1791-1872) and the laying of the transatlantic cable really represented the world’s first communications internet.  The speed of information transfer from the United States to Europe overnight went from three weeks to three minutes.  In her book “Team of Rivals,” Doris Kearns Goodwin describes the transmission of Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address throughout the nation.  This occurred in 1860 just before the laying of Transcontinental Telegraph.  The speech was delivered just before noon, but the text printed in newspapers did not reach the anxious Frances and Fanny Seward in Auburn NY until late at night.  Because of the Pony Express the speech could be read in Sacramento a mere seven days and seventeen hours after its delivery in Washington.

We tend to focus on the snail’s pace time that it took to receive the address.  However, what we should be focusing on is that people read, analyzed, and discussed the text of the address.  People greedily processed information in those days.  The Lincoln-Douglas debates followed a fixed format.  The first speech was an hour long.  This was followed by and hour and a half response.  Finally, the first speaker got a half hour to rebut the response.  So all this totaled three hours of intense reasoning and rhetoric.  Contrast this with today’s debates.  The speakers are lucky to get three minutes to answer a question and rebut.  Most people don’t watch the whole debate, content to watch the sound bites selected by the commentators that agree with their point of view.  The same is true of the inaugural speeches.

The meme of the image, the meme of a picture is all that remains.  Most people are not critical.  If Obama speaks, there’s a whole group that’s going to agree and a whole group that’s going to disagree, based solely on the fact that Obama said it.  Show his picture, the Obama meme, and we immediately like or dislike, hate or love. The effect is just as reflexive.

We really need to ask ourselves how in a society as educated as ours we have let our politics become so very superficial.  A large part of the blame lies in our need to communicate so fast that rational thought becomes a quite impossible luxury.  But, we are dealing with very real, very pressing, and very life or death issues.  This is the very dark side of allowing images and memes to become a shorthand that enables us to avoid thinking.

“Science, abstract geometric art, and human disaster;” those are strange words to string together.  On May 20th an EF5 tornado touched down and slashed across Moore, OK, killing 24 people and injuring 387.  It is now estimated that 1,150 homes were destroyed with total damage estimated to be $2 billion. But really how do you measure the scars on human life that such a killer storm causes?  Each one of those lives and each one of those homes holds a story of deep personal tragedy.

Among its “Pictures of the Week” this past week,  NBC News features an eery satellite image of the tornado’s path.  It was taken with the ASTER instrument on NASA’s Terra satellite.  The image is so-called false-colored.  It emphasizes the infrared, shown in red, where redness indicates vegetation.  Gray areas indicate buildings and pavement.  The twister’s path of destruction is the sharp brown streaks slashing across the image where all vegetation has been totally destroyed.

The picture is very strange and surreal.  It appears like some kind of geometric abstraction.  But really it’s the scientific abstraction that truly grabs us.  Our minds connect this distant quantitative image with the hundreds of images that we have already seen from ground-based cameras of the human tragedy that unfolded on the ground.  It’s very impersonal from space and very real on the ground.

Figure 1 – Raphael’s Madonna of the Chair, 1515 – the ultimate meme. From Wikipaintings and in the public domain.

I have received some very interesting comments from readers Megan and Andrew regarding my post about the Turkish woman in red.  The discussion really returns us to the view that an image is a meme.  We see it and we draw connotation from it, and the connotation is culturally-based.  In a western context, the dress on the woman is not the uniform of a protestor.  She is an innocent caught up in a violent and violating act.  And yes, the connotation would be different, although not necessarily unsympathetic if the victim was a young man in blue jeans.  In other cultures, perhaps more religiously conservative ones, she might be viewed quite differently.  She might be viewed as getting what she deserves.  The point is that images are powerful memes and that attaching connotation to them is not only what happens but is so ingrained in our psyches as to be what must happen. The process is intrinsic to our circuitry.  We are organizing our thoughts and reactions, connecting with others of our culture in defining how we will react.

And yes again, regardless of our culture, we are stereotyping.  I would suggest that if memes are such an important innate aspect of human thought and culture, then stereotyping becomes innate as well.  We are taught in western culture that stereotyping is bad.  You learn it in preschool – “respect diversity.”  In railing against stereotyping we are seeking to overpower the innate with our intellects.  This is a good thing, but we always have to recognize that our initial reaction will be the innate and overcoming that first impression will be a task.  In fact, I would argue that the only way to truly overcome stereotyping is to replace one meme with another.

Our concern here is about the power of image.  So I hesitate to go further down this path of arguing about right and wrong and stereotyping.  However, it has to be recognized that saying that stereotyping is wrong, which I believe to be true, because my mother taught me so, is paradoxical to the concept of all inclusiveness and respecting diversity.  This was pointed out by Allan Bloom in his book “The Closing of the American Mind.”  Traditionally, all cultures believe that they have “the truth” and as a result are superior to all other cultures.  To say that we have obtained a new truth, that all cultures and their practices must be respected, so called cultural relativism, is to say that our culture has a greater truth than all others – that we are superior because of attaining this greater truth.

Also in the face of cultural relativism is that we firmly believe that certain practices are fundamentally wrong. Slavery, suppression of women or any group, child abuse are examples.  We condemn those cultures that practice these.  Well, so be it!  What we wish for the world is a more inclusive and freer society – which calls for an evolution of culture.  Whether the human race will ever achieve such utopia is under question.  Will such a culture evolve out of what Joseph Campbell referred to as the mythic ruins of our modern day world or whether culture conflict will remain the norm, really remains to be seen.  What we may be certain of is that we will always hold powerful images in our minds that connect us all.