Lewis Hine

Lewis Wickes Hine was born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin on 26th September 1874. He studied sociology in Chigago and New York, before finding work at the Ethical Culture School, Hine purchased his first camera in 1903, employed his photographs in his teaching and established documentary photography.

Hine used his camera to capture the poverty he witnessed in New York. Which included the study of Ellis Island immigrants. In 1908 Hine published ‘charities and the cammons’, a collection of photographs of tenements and sweatshops. He used these images to help bring about social reform. He told one meething that he beleive his photographs would encourage people to ‘exert the force to right wrongs’.

One of the major pieces of work Hine did was working for the National Child Labour Committee photographing child labour in the Carolinas and day labours before their time. Hine travelled the country photographing children working in factories. In one 12 month period he covered over 12,000 miles.

Unlike photographers hired by Thomas Bernardo, hine made no attempt to exaggerate the poverty of these young people. Critics claimed his images weren’t ‘shocking enough’. hine argued that people were more likely to join the campaign against child labour if they felt the photographs accurately captured the reality of the situation.

What I like about Hines work is that is a true abmount of whats goin on, he doesnt like to exaggerate the truth, he does not add anything to his images, what you see is truely what is happening. I have seen many of the bernardo images and they are just awful. I would like to make tre documentary images rather than images that have been edited and added to make it more dramatic.

When I go to document the village i wasn to capture the true nature of the village and the people in it.