Unforgettable Photos - from Dismal World.
Wow.
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5 Comments
why?
each of those photos served as a powerful tool and serves and a strong reminder, but a collection of images purely to inspire depression and woe in the viewer seems…well, dismal.
I don’t think the goal is “purely to inspire depression and woe in the viewer”. It may be a possible result, and perhaps even intended, but not as the end in itself but rather as a means to an end.
If you check the site’s home page, it says:
While at first glance, that does paint a rather negative picture, there’s also another aspect to it (at least the way I see it). Everything listed in that text and represented in the photos is a result of what humans do (or neglect to do) to/for each other or themselves.
It can be depressing but motivating and inspiring at the same time, because of the potential for change in our behaviors and the kinds of things that progress / “enlightenment” / whatever you want to call it (from a personal to a global level) could accomplish, and it’s therefore worthwhile to try.
I think it gives great reason to really think and pray about our part in serving people. Look how things have NOT changed over the years. I might more ask ‘Why?” about that.
if it is a goal of the site owners to cause people to take action on any of the dozens of subjects and causes represented by those photos, they make no effort whatsoever to communicate or encourage that whatsoever. it seems to me, rather, that the point of the website is that humans are utterly lost and hopeless and self-destructive and that any effort to change that is meaningless. that’s the message i got looking at the site.
I guess it’s a matter of interpretation, and maybe what you bring to it when you see it. Maybe they intended it that way, and that’s why they left out the hand-holding, explicit message.
I could be wrong too; but like most other art, different people can get different things out of it without necessarily being “right” or “wrong” in their perceptions.
I think that the obvious, surface goal is to make you think about the things the pictures depict. Whether the artist had any other desired outcomes is speculation, but the further conclusions that both of us have drawn (neither of which were stated on the site) is just a matter of how we look at it, I guess.