From the end of the 19th century through the 20th century, documentary photography left behind faithful images that comprise a glorious cultural asset. Here at the beginning of a new century, amid an explosion of information and with society growing ever more diverse, our spoken and written language and visual images, even more than striving for faithful depiction, hope to convey a new vision.
Documentary photography is altogether different from salon photography, which takes its cues from the fine arts. Documentary photography records and informs its viewers about people, events, locales, and objects. Sometimes it stresses the timeliness or the immediacy of news events. It is a field that combines descriptive structure with social criticism, and thus, unlike most photojournalism, requires that its practitioners delve into the social background and make explorations into history and culture.
The wheels of time and history are continually turning-- change never stops. What can be saved are records of an age. To make an excellent record of history, though, one must develop an innovative and farsighted documentary perspective, lest one's work be little more than the filing of unrelated images. Working as a photographer in this time of information overflow requires professional expertise to create a new documentary perspective. And a new vision for documentary photography goes beyond theory to involve the way one looks at, thinks about, and shoots subject matter and finally to the way that the image is conveyed. Documentary photography has a very special nature that spurs its viewers' imaginations to reach different conclusions about people, events, objects, or even the environment as a whole. From observing, reading, and conversing, to finally conveying an image of culture and art--these collectively comprise a new vision of documentary photography.
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The Gong-a Tsui Theater/ Liu Chen-hsiang
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Yi people's fire worship/ Pao Li-hui
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Tao people/ Wang Wei-chang
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Life of ordinary country folk/ Hou Teng-ko
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Cityscape, Henan/ Yu Te-shui
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Wumeng coal mine/ Keng Yun-sheng
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Old leper/ Chang Tsang-song
