Walker Evans Essay Research Paper One of — страница 2

Burroughses house. They were the poorest of the three families. The other families only gave one-third of their profit from farming to the landowner. The Burroughses were known as half-croppers and gave half of their crop to the landowner. (Rathbone 128) Their house just yelled out poverty when they seen it. Both Agee and Evans though highly of the backwoods family though. There was no disguise with them, the family was very well preserved and gained the men s respect. The photographs that Evans took showed the beauty in the house, even though a normal eye couldn t see it. Evans used every effort possible to make the not at all extravagant dwellings of the family, beautiful. This was the way he thought of the family, so this would be the way he portrayed them in the photos. Once

finished Fortune rejected the photos and text from Agee and Evans, saying that the show of poverty was unacceptable for their magazine. The men then decided to turn the information into a book. It took several years but was finally published by Houghton Mifflin. (http://miuraj.tripod.co.jp) Walker Evans was the first photographer to be given a one-man exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art. He was even given this honor before such names as, Alfred Stieglitz and Edward Steichen. It was like having a calling card or yet, a passport, Evans later said. (Rathbone 167) In 1940 Walker also received the Guggenheim Fellowship award. Evans later went to work for Fortune magazine. They saw him as risky, but he was well qualified with his previous awards and accomplishments. Evans was now on

the full-time staff of the magazine as a photographer. Even though early in his life he was out to be a writer. Walker was sent to Chicago to photograph. He said that it was much more rundown than when he was there as a young boy. (Rathbone 200) He took pictures of rundown townhouses, saying to himself that Chicago was then a city too impatient for its own progress. He also photographed the subways and streets. He was famous for this along with his everyday people, and the poverty stricken sharecroppers. Evans was sent to many other places to photograph for Fortune. It was all expenses paid, that is what he loved most about it. He continued to travel and take his famous pictures. After working for Fortune for nearly twenty years, he retired. In the summer of 1956, Sports

Illustrated assigned him to a story on British sporting events. This gave him his first visit to England. (Rathbone 227) Evans also worked for the Farm Security Administration and numerous other magazines and museums. Walker Evans was most famous for his photos of the Southern sharecroppers in his first book, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, and his photos from the depression era. There was also a book that Evans created that held many famous photographs taken by him. They were held in his book, American Photographs, and was said to be a book that every photographer needed to own. American Photographs was set up with many different photos. The depression, everyday working people, the streets and subways and strangely enough license plates, from all the eras that Evans was associated

with. (http://photography.miningco.com) The final years of Walker Evans life were spent at Yale School of Art and Architecture. He worked there as a teacher for the last ten years of his life. His students and co-workers looked up to him. Listening very intently to his words and his works of art, his photographs, as they should. Mr. Evans died in New Haven, Connecticut in 1975. 320