White Balance: The Legacy of Racism in Photographic Technology – Lorelai Robideaux
Above left: A photograph of Edward Steichen’s Family of Man exhibition at the MoMA in 1955.
Above right: Natalie Le Brun [right] and Guilado Sarr [left], Paris, France 1973. Kodak film (125ASA) used on Canon camera.
Abstract
This thesis examines the impact of racism through a multi-layered study of photographic technology from its birth in 1839 through its transition from film to digital equipment. By examining the historical intersection between racism and photography, I clarify its progression by which social movements transform its existence. The time period studied includes the amalgamation of the arts and sciences, the end of colonial rule, the swelling and abolishment of slavery, and the photographic and social disruption of Black political power. I use three major strategies: (1,2) content and object analysis to specifically critique the user, the viewer, and the technology itself and (3) a dialectical inquiry as a form of qualitative research analysis. Research has been collected from libraries at The New School: Parsons School of Design, Elmer Holmes Bobst Library at New York University, and the New York Public Library, from internships with Velem Studios and Sarah Silver Productions, and published reports that have provided data to complete a comprehensive analysis of wealth disparities among Black and White households. Some view racism as something that is separate from the institution of American society, but this thesis challenges these arguments by distinctly pointing out its relationship to photographic practices. Photography, as practice and object, and technology have individually created independent structures of excellence as we can see living in the age of the technological revolution. This thesis gives a thorough critique of current behavioral patterns involving photographic technology. It doesn’t explain everything about racism and its legacy but it does acknowledge that segregation happened by law, not by natural I occurrence. Therefore, the importance of distinction is necessary to the formulation of this paper.