Blog Commentary #3: Iconic Photos

Assigned in class Week 5.  You have a choice to comment either on this post or post #4 (to come next week) on branding in consumer or commercial photography.

An iconic photograph is a photograph that becomes well-known and recognized in popular culture, so much so that it comes to stand in for the event that it captures.  For instance, Joe Rosenthal's Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima came to stand in for American victory in WWII:

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The image became, among other things, a way to sell war bonds, a postage stamp, and a bronze memorial in Washington, DC.  It also inspired this photo by Thomas Franklin of firemen at Ground Zero, which also became an iconic image of 9/11:

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 Choose one of the iconic photographs below to research (or find your own):

– Kevin Carter - Vulture Stalking a Child

-- Richard Drew – The Falling Man

-- Huynh Cong Ut – Napalm Strike

-- Dorothea Lange - Migrant Mother

--John Filo - Kent State Massacre 

-- Mike Wells - Famine in Karamoja

-- Lewis Hine - Breaker Boys

-- Photographer Unknown - 1968 Olympics Black Power salute

-- Edmund Hillary - Tenzing on Summit

-- Françoise Demulder - Palestinian Woman Pleads with Soldier

-- Alfred Eisenstaedt - V-J Day

-- Eddie Adams - Execution of a Viet Cong Guerrilla

-- Malcolm Browne - Burning Monk

-- Stuart Franklin -- Tank Man of Tiananmen Square

-- Photographer Unknown -- Hooded Man in Abu Ghraib

After conducting some research, post a link to the photo, along with the photographer's name (if known), and answer the following questions:

What year was it taken?

What event was it depicting?

How did people react to its publication?

How does the photographer feel about capturing the image/ sharing it with the public?

Why do you think this image has become iconic?