Maitane Romagosa essay

Gordon Parks was a celebrated composer, author, and filmmaker with a deep passion for social justice. He was born into poverty and segregation in Kansas in 1912. Gordon used photography as a means to raise awareness of the struggles facing the African-American community in the united states during the civil rights movement. Many of his photographs aim to depict the harsh reality of the world black lived in. American Gothic is considered to be his signature photograph, taken in 1942, during his fellowship with the FSA, a government agency set up by Roosevelt to help farmers in despair. It was taken on his very first day in Washington, when he was struck by the large disparity between whites and blacks in the city. This image would become the symbol of the pre-civil rights era.

In his photograph, American Gothic, Park posed an African American woman in front of the American flag, imitating the famous painting American Gothic by Grant Wood. The women pictured here shows up in many of Parks works. She is Ella Watson, a government charwoman employed by the FSA (Food Security Administration). The expression in her face is fierce and strong, looking straight at the camera. The picture represents how the African American population during this time did not have access to the same rights and civil liberties that the American flag behind her promises to give. The reference to the American gothic painting only emphasizes the irony in the photo. The picture-perfect ideal of the white American with wealth and family is replaced by the stark image of an African-woman holding up her own mop and broom.

In the photo, she only holds the broom in her hand, perhaps symbolizing that the segregation of African-Americans only allowed them half the rights they deserved. The focus is on her and the vertical length of the photo catches the eye and lead right to the subject in the photo. All attention in the photo is on the subject and not on the out-of-focus flag and mop in the back. It serves a poignant purpose and makes the image more human and less detached. Gordon in this photo is equating this poor woman who works in the bureaucracy at a low level as the image of American freedom and rights. The image contrast and set up are effective in their aim to use the subject as a representational figure.