In one of the worst years of the Depression, 1938, photographers of New York's storied Lower East Side (LES) lacked the anti-poverty fervor of the New Deal. Their cameras found prosaic the crowded thoroughfares of a hardscrabble population (Klein 13). The same year, opposed to that negative imagery, was the progressive school cum gallery, the Photo League (PL). Instead of the normative drabness, the PL found a dignified human landscape in images of the LES people. Wrote the eminent Walter Benjamin, the new wave "is now incapable of photographing a tenement...without transfiguring it."

The PL developed a new approach for its students, many from immigrant families on the LES. It combined workshops with darkrooms, lectures by eminent practitioners, and opportunities to exhibit at its gallery (Klein 29). The PL balanced the documentary and the aesthetic, as seen in the early-twentieth century masters of LES depiction, Lewis Hine and Paul Strand. Among those of enduring reputation were the PL alums such as Lisette Model whose discourse of oddness influenced Diane Arbus. Model described one of her signature photos, Little Man, Lower East Side, as portraying the area's "misfits in a cruel environment" (qtd. in Kozloff 45). In Only with God, Arnold Eagle's lens captured weary Orthodox Jews on a local street with Hebrew signs. Addressing a desolate adolescence, Morris Engel's Boy in the Street offered a lone child on an unpaved tenement block.  

Known by many for his later World War II photography – including most notably the 1944 American D-Day landing at Omaha Beach in Normandy as well as images from Dachau at the end of the war – Walter Rosenblum (1919-2006) was mentored by Hine and Strand in the PL. As a young man, Rosenblum shared the resistance of his colleagues to the normative, but did not participate in that which was dismissive, condescending, or party to the discourse of LES sorrows. He also preferred to focus on a narrow area. Rather than traversing myriad avenues as other photographers might, he selected just one, Pitt Street, where he spent six months gaining trust so that his subjects simply forgot he was there while also keeping at a distance with his camera, which needed many hours worth of adjustment.

His Romanian immigrant parents had lived for years on Rivington Street just around the corner. Rosenblum walked the neighborhood and passed the street en route to grade school as well as college. In all ways, he was alive to the opportunities, armed by his egalitarianism, and inspired by the explorative nature of his craft. His goal: a homage to the Pitt Street community (see Figure 1). In a later interview, Rosenblum explained, “I portrayed them as decent human beings who were full of life” (qtd. in Briely). We can see his philosophy at work in Candy Store (1938), also known as Chick's Candy Store, and Moving Man (1938).

Figure 1

I propose that these two examples represent a creative physicality generated by the subjects themselves. Formally and substantively, the photographer's challenge was to let the subject "speak for itself in its own way" (Siskind qtd. in Rhem). Rosenblum made a significant impact by shifting the focus from the observer's interpretation to the subjects' own narratives in street photography. By emphasizing the agency of the individuals he studied, he allowed their gestures and personal expressions to shape the portrayal of their lives. This approach not only highlighted their authenticity but also enriched the representation of working-class experiences through a more intimate and self-directed lens.

The discussion that follows illustrates the contradictions at the heart of the two Rosenblum photographs and tells the secrets these photos encode. This restriction to these two, however memorable, has risks. Among them are their narrowness of focus and thus the faulty generalizations that might be drawn. I do not propose the selections are conclusive. Rather, these two examples  stand at opposite ends of the spectrum and provide the best opportunity for an investigation of range, iterations, and themes in Rosenblum's LES photography.

As Rosenblum's World War II photos took center stage, published attention to the Pitt series virtually disappeared in the postwar period when "proletarian" subjects were no longer fashionable (Deschin 11). In the 1950s, a "friendly" colleague nevertheless  termed the  series “idealized” (White). Although a New York Times author did not mention the Pitt series by name, his judgment deemed it "sentimental" (Cotter). Positive curatorial paragraphs aside, only two books contain substantial sections and commentary on the work, and they are published by friends and family: Walter Rosenblum and Strand + Rosenblum. The most affirming tribute appears in a documentary produced by his own daughter, Nina: In Search of Pitt Street (1999). Interviews with Walter as well as photos from the series are woven throughout as her father reminisces about his Rivington-Pitt youth, which establishes this film as a crucial documentary of Walter's life as an LES visual chronicler.

Candy Store captures a small masculine group whose stocky central figure points to those he is facing. However much the eyes move to the flanking figures, they always return to the gesturer who appears to be speaking with authority. Adding to the caption years later, Rosenblum explained that the men were "arguing about politics" (qtd. in Brierly). Augmenting the central activity, the store's backdrop includes store goods crammed against the windows, clothing, even the small package one man carries and – though hardly visible – the customers in the store itself.

Adding to the authenticity, Rosenblum's wife, the eminent photography historian Naomi, observed that the picture in question was candid. Rosenblum found the "decisive moment," in the term of the great Paris photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson, without the figures' "implicit consent and participation" (Herzog 92). Proof that Rosenblum did not direct or pose the subject lies in the clearly unposed bookended figures: in the lower left quadrant, a woman sits in a chair observing the activities of the street; in the lower right quadrant, a little boy peers through a fence.

Why does the unposed nature of this photo matter? The spontaneity conveys an unpredictability that renders the narrative unstable. If they are debating, why do they block the entrance? Is each man and the one young boy riveted or bored by the man who points at them? Given their nearness to the entrance, are they exercising a transient "ownership" of the space? What of the ghosted figures inside the store? Mysteries abound.

Within a personalized mapping, each reveals a private world. Even the physical closeness betokens a prior and impending mobility. The positioning of the well-dressed men and the boy so close to the store puzzles the viewer. So too does the indifference of the clerk leaning against the door as well as the complete exclusion of the women and little boy bookended on the lower left and right quadrants of the picture. Gestures provide the only evidence that, still heedless of the camera, they composed themselves, whether for passersby or not. In sum, apart from the avalanche of sustaining details, the subjects have – by their very own self-arranging – chosen particular identities. In Rosenblum’s ideology of balance, the image as a whole unites all in spatial expressiveness.

Asserting the "ill-defined" nature of 1930s art photography, a judgment frequently agreed upon by photographic historians, William Stott in his study of 1930s culture opined that the vast Depression-era collection produced aesthetic respectability (Raeburn 10; Stott 20). The Farm Security Administration (FSA) photographer Walker Evans complained   that his output was not taken seriously as art. Even his signature collection,  American Photographs (1938), only generated praise by  one  biographer’s claim that his monograph embedded the "unexpected beauty of the ordinary" (Rathbone 116).

In a broader sense, many linked social-realist photos, whether they orginated with PL or FSA photographers. To that end, while highlighting Dorothea Lange's Migrant Mother, one eminent historian of 1930s culture contended that these kinds of photographs “make demands on us” (Stein 3). Some photos invoked Rembrandt's "expanse [and] depth," as in Old Master paintings. In the classic Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, Evans's co-author, James Agee, found the pathetically trusting families "standing like classic columns" (qtd. in Rathbone 126).

As a visitor to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rosenblum would have encountered masterpieces of Christian art, evident in his stated appreciation for the  Baroque painter Caravaggio. Applying the  comparative method above to the Candy Store "instructor," we might find a  Jesus figure among his disciples. A  likely precursor or source of inspiration may have been Caravaggio's The Calling of Saint Matthew (1599-1600) (see Figure 2). In this painting, Christ points to an avaricious tax collector, among a respectful, plebeian  assembly. The presence of the men and boy does not denote sainted worshippers. Rather, they represent a meeting between the divine and the secular. Yet even if this possible inspiration for  Rosenblum's work has merit, the photographer is most likely presenting the viewer with a satire of the original work. In other words, Candy Store's  "everyday life” may represent a satirical counternarrative to Caravaggio's biblical scene.

Figure 2

Before leaving my analysis of Candy Store, I would like to address the woman and boy in the lower, outer quadrents of Rosenblum's framing. But  rather than contend they are a set of allegorical symbols,  I find it more useful to scrutinize how each elects to place the body. Rosenblum prided himself on uniting every element in the composition. Read that way, we know the two are not visual after thoughts.The aged housewife in the lower left is linked to mature womanhood, which in turn connects to the playful little boy. The woman represents self-containment as her willed exclusion from sociability is at odds with the mutuality of the men and boy in front of Chick's. Cocooned in practical clothing easily reused, her hair as severe as  her expression, she is a Pitt Street stoic.

No better example of flexibility as expressiveness is this self-created game the boy plays. His space is  minimalism  itself, but it  enables a kind of bricolage. A gymnast, he applies his elastic form to an imaginary goal. The  facial hiddenness reveals more than it conceals. His shirt stretched in the back,  his bent form and raised shoes belie the need for other evidence. His  interiority  bespeaks a world of his own.

In the Pitt Street series in general and in the above exemplars, Rosenblum was meticulous in seeking a balance. Yet again, secrets abound. Everything about the woman's pose suggests she has dug in. To return to Stein's reminder of deeper truths,  the woman's separateness is layered with a declaration of self-assertion – so too for the little boy.

Turning to our study of Moving Man, we know Rosenblum was no stranger to manual labor from his early experiences with long pushcart days to janitorial work at the PL. We have no evidence the  eponymous man featured in the photograph was known on Pitt Street, much less that he was aware of or trusted the photographer who used an early version of a telephoto lens. That the toiler is African American is paramount in importance. Evident as well is that more work, including moving a large armchair, is in store. Balancing a heavy load, especially given the uneven bricks on which he is standing, reinforces the impression of his hard work and pragmatism. Adding to the documentary nature of this photo are details such as clothing and practical stance.

Racism abounded in the work of photographers such as Walker Evans. Moving jobs were usually reserved for the jobless "male and pale" teamsters of 1930s New York. Sadly, people like Evans would have kept it that way. For example, he was also unsympathetic to the black population of sharecroppers in the Midwest  (Thompson 113). In his customary, meticulous  shooting  script, he made a point of separating Pittsburgh's "city people" from "Negroes," the latter no doubt nearby and unwelcome. Equally upsetting,  Gordon Parks, the only black man hired for the FSA, encountered white staffers who caviled at developing his photos (196). All of these telling descriptions reveal workplace prejudice. Some believed African Americans were not only dangerous but also illogical, lazy, and unintelligent, too.
           
These threats to the black laborer are defused in Moving Man by the impressiveness of his response to an arduous task. Mike Rose's The Mind at Work: Valuing the intelligence of the American Worker stresses the importance of the face in that endeavor. Validating this view is an august art historian’s: the “working of brain was reflected in the imagined movement of the face” (Pope-Hennessy 109). Hence the importance of seeing the Moving Man's physiognomy. His face encodes solving the problem. Taken together, face, gesture, stance, and posture reveal his absorption in the job. His clothes, though frayed, suggest an ethical, hard-worker. Rather than a body first, a man transcends the paid task. Both invoking and surpassing artistic precedent, the  photo reinforces a contribution to the life of the street. In other words, Rosenblum centers and uplifts rather than ignoring or denigrating black men.

Of course, the differences with Candy Store are clear. But, as with the first photo we discussed, there is a mystery at the core of  the picture. The sunlight that illuminates the  trunk is mythic enough to remind art  experts of  Atlas paintings such as Giovanni Guercino's Atlas Holding up the Celestial Globe (1646) (see Figure 3). In both cases, an unseen source lights up the figure. Some viewers of Rosenblum's photograph Moving Man argue that the  solo figure employs the same hand movements as does Atlas of the painting. There is also a shared mystic quality. In the  Guercino portrayal, the light from the unseen source may shine on the body, but only to highlight his burden. In the Pitt Street portrait, by contrast, the sun illuminates the subject's ingenuity as he strategially solves the problem of weight and balance. Rosenblum's photo thus undercuts the techniques of Old Master painting. Except parodically, Moving Man has no linkage to a mannerist tradition.

Figure 3

In today's parlance, the worker is one with the work. As a compelling figure, he provides visual evidence that there is nothing common about the so-called average man. Rather, the image overturns  the condescending view embedded in the  judgment of "commonplace everyday people" (Rathbone 283). 

Sarah Meisler, in assessing key 1930s photos as sites of multiple interpretations, reminds us that  "claims of truth in photographs can be complicated" (34). This perception is particularly apt for Candy Store and Moving Man. Rosenblum captured the life-affirming  qualities of those he studied. But his legacy was to give over the authority of individuation to the people present in their own lives. It was their own discourse of the gestural that helped form a new working-class street photography.

WORK CITED

Benjamin, Walter. "A Short History of Photography." www.artforum.com/features/walter-benjamins-short-history-of-photography-209486/

Briely, Dean. Interview with Walter Rosenblum, photographyinterviews.blogspot.com/2012/08/walter-rosenblum-committed-optimist.htm

Cotter,  Holland. "Tender Witness to the Togetherness of People in Want." The New York Times, www.nytimes.com/1998/05/01/arts/photography-review-tender-witness-to-the-togetherness-of-people-in-want.html

Deschin, Jacob. "On Faithful Reporting."  New York Times, 5 June 1949, p. 11.

Herzog, Melanie, and Douglas R. Nickel. Milton Rogovin: The Making of a Social Documentary Photographer. U of Arizona P, 2006.

In Search of Pitt Street. Directed by Nina Rosenblum, Daedalus Productions, 1999.

Klein,  Mason. "Of Politics and Poetry: The Dilemma of the Photo League." New York: Capital of Photography, edited by Max Kozloff, Yale UP, 2002, pp. 10-13.

Kozloff, Max. New York: Capital of Photography. Yale UP, 2002.

Meisler, Sarah. Dorothea Lange: Migrant Mother: MoMA One on One Series. The Museum of Modern Art, 2019.

Pope-Hennessey, John.The Portrait in the Renaissance. Phaidon, 2003.

Raeburn, John. A Staggering Revolution: A Cultural History of Thirties Photography. U of  Illinois P, 2006.

Rathbone, Belinda, and Walker Evans. Walker Evans: A Biography. Houghton Mifflin, 1995.

Rhem, James. "Aaron Siskind." lesdoucheslagalerie.com/usr/documents/exhibitions/press_ release_url/76/pk_aaron_siskind_epure_photographique.pdf

Rose, Mike. The Mind at Work: Valuing the Intelligence of the American Worker. Phaidon, 2014.

Rosenblum, Naomi, Walter Rosenblum, and Shelley Rice. Walter Rosenblum. Verlag der Kunst, 1990.

Stein, Sally. Migrant Mother, Migrant Gender. Oxford UP, 2000.

Stott, William. Documentary Expression in Thirties America. U of Chicago P, 1983.

Thompson, Jerry and Walker Evans. Walker Evans at Work. Harper and Row, 1990.

Stand, Paul, and Walter Rosenblum. Strand + Rosenblum: Enduring Friendship. AdmirA Edizioni, 2011.

From Laura Hapke, Independent Scholar, author of Sweatshop: The History of an American Idea and Labor's Text: The Worker in American Fiction

Photo Credit: Signal Corps Photographic Combat Unit, 1944, Walter Rosenblum pictured far right

October 2024