Family Moment
Photograph, 1960
Gordon Cummings (American, 1919 - 2005)
Questions for group discussion.
1. What the heck is going on in this photograph?
2. Is this a typical mid-century family portrait, a slice-of-life documentary, or was the action deliberately staged? By whom?
3. The cowboy motif commands the center of interest. How do you think this tableau reflects the time, culture, or society in which it was created?
4. The woman who attends the young cowboy actors - is she deliberately averting her eyes from the camera’s gaze, or perhaps playing the role of nurse to assure that no children are harmed during the making of this picture?
5. What is the meaning of the child on the porch defiantly turning his back to camera and clutching the window frame?
6. And what of the little girl with the pacifier? She is the only one looking at the lens and seems oblivious to the scene behind her.
7. Did you notice how the photographer placed himself in the composition? What could possibly have been going through his mind at the moment he made this photograph?