IC w7 - Black white with shades of gray.
- HildeMaassen
- Mar 8, 2020
- 30 min read
Updated: Aug 15, 2020
Note.
I wrote this article during the last year of my BA in 1992-1993. The BA was a 5 years study at the time and the last year was devoted to a final project and writing an article. I spend this week to type it (didn’t have it digital) and translate it as well as I could because I had to think of it during almost al the lectures. I think almost everything mentioned this module is in here.
It is about the Vanaculair, subjectivity, about the intent and choices, the making and the taking, tracing, the gaze, a glimpse of things, voyeurisme, nothing is off limit, responses and responsibilities, isolating what is there, the simulacra, momentums, the banal, value, seeing and looking, the influence of text, the way it is shown.
I didn’t change a thing; when it says “this century”, it is the past century(1900-2000) and the past century is (1800-1900). The ’60 is referring to 1960. I could not find all images on the internet so some are photos of the photo, and some I left away.
Teju Cole - object lessons; The more photographs shock, the more difficult it is for them to be pinned to their local context, and the more easily they are indexed to our mental library of generic images.
Black white with shades of gray.
Introduction May 1993, Hilde Maassen
Montesquieu 1748: "It is impossible to assume that these creatures are humans; for allowing them to be creatures would lead us to the conclusion that we are not Christians ourselves."
How have blacks been portrayed through, primarily, whites over the years and especially within photography, and beatword that way of photographing pre-existing stereotypes? When considered, black and white photography also has greyish nuances, which also applies to the answer to the above question. How is the photo viewed, viewed and interpreted by the viewer?
If the photo does not in any way give the idea of conforming to stereotypes, the caption may invalidate this idea. The intention of the photographer is important here as well as any associations that are generated. Finally, the location where the photo is taken can also cause problems for the entourage.
The reason why I write this is the exclamation "you can't do this, this is discrimination" as a result of showing one of my photos. This created the need for me to find out to what extent discrimination is taking place with regard to blacks and the extent to which we get to see stereo types through photos.
Slavery and the church
Race inequality, in particular the distinction in the treatment - and representation - of black and white is based on the difference in skin color; social distinction, with the intention of keeping one group of people, on the basis of the difference in skin color, poor and powerless, on the lowest steps of the social ladder. The slave trade was created by the desire for money and power. Even, or rather, the Catholic Church played a role in this. At the end of the 15th century, the church expressed the view that Christians should not be enslaved if there was an alternative. In 1537 it was written in the bull by Pope Paul that Indians (now called Native Americans) were declared "real people." So slavery already existed before the colonial era. The early slaves, of European descent, were considered and treated as a social class, a necessary part of the social order, even though it was the lowest part of it. There were laws and customs to regulate that slavery. Slaves could regain their freedom and even climb to the top of the social ladder.
The colonial slave The "colonial" black slave, on the other hand, was not seen and treated as a person. He had no legal rights, let alone a legal position. He stood outside society and was bought and sold as a profitable item. Used for what was needed. That even black slaves were human could not be denied, but the argument that they were not 100% human did fit into the conviction of European culture. After all, Catholicism had for centuries claimed that a person was only fully human if he believed in that one true church. Non-believing value of the inferior human kind. This belief was useful in early European history and was used against Jews who "allegedly killed Christ." They were subjected to all kinds of tyranny. Abused to do dirty work in the business and financial world that one is dangerous for the Christian soul.
The Bible was also used extensively in the Middle Ages to wash hands with regard to the different treatment of groups of people. The free interpretation here was that in the passage about Cham, so cursed from Noah by God because he had seen his father's nakedness, his descendants would be eternally condemned to slaves and servants. It was stated in the Middle Ages that this section applied to the lowest ranks of society, the poorest farmers and serfs, at the time of colonial slavery the explanation was that this section applied to the blacks. So the thoughts that underlie European culture is that European is superior. This thought was often justified by pointing the white finger at the physical differences and the uncivilized and barbaric behavior of blacks. They were considered stupid, strong, lazy and cunning.
The devil
The color scheme black for the devil, white for the pure can be found on one of the Benetton advertising photos from the 1991 campaign. A black boy is depicted as a little devil, her hair braided into cones. The contrast between the Christian light and the whiteness, is portrayed on the poster by a white girl who smiles angelically.
European culture has linked the color black for centuries and darkness, fear and evil. Hieronymus Bosch, whose paintings dealt with good and evil, color the people white and the devil black. The medieval name for the devil is: "the black" or "black peter". We encounter that name every year around Sinterklaas in the Netherlands and Belgium. One of the attributes that "our" Zwarte Piet has with him, the roe, is an old Germanic symbol of fertility with which he can no longer be safeguarded from eroticism. With his Moorish costume, he is a continuation of the figure of the Moorish servant, who, moreover, is usually depicted in small pieces to confirm the oriental feeling. The card game blackjack can also be interpreted negatively; the Zwarte piet is the accident card here and the accompanying saying is pulling the Zwarte Piet. The thoughts of the former Europeans was that the color of the skin provided the indelible and indisputable proof that they, the blacks, could never change and therefore never be anything else than slaves, servants of a white master.
Erotic photos Christianity has a lot of power during this century. Therefore, even at the beginning of this century, nudity is still considered sinful and unclean. Nudity refers to danger corruption and death according to Christian thinking. The inhabitants of hell were naked, the nakedness of the sinner. Nudity is thus a negative symbol of spiritual purity and innocence of the primitive idealized primordial state of mankind before the fall. The erotic photos from the colonies, on which nude black women are depicted, in graceful and erotic poses engulfing Europe after the invention of a postcard, alone help to keep a negative European image of others, especially black, instantaneous. . Blacks were seen as shameless, immoral and uncontrolled. The photographs from the colonies, often set in scene, answer pre-existing European ideas about the primitive natural man and, in the case of the nudes, meet the needs of the European man. It is also for this reason that the photos of colonials were not portrayed by old women or young yet mature women. Men are also extremely rare. Even in Indonesia where people cannot really be called black, these standardized timeless and nameless photos are produced in series. The changes in Indonesian society such as the pursuit of independence in the economic, cultural and political spheres did not fit into the European image and are therefore not reflected in the photos.
These erotic colonial photos were taken both in studios and on the field. The studio photos are distinguished from the field recordings because they portray a sophisticated sensuality and show idealized women while the field photos convey the atmosphere of raw, animal and wild eroticism. Two photos of the same action clearly show the difference between the realistic documentary and the romantic-aesthetic photography from the colonies. The fact that women often felt watched can be clearly seen in a number of other shots, the shy or uncomfortable effects and embarrassed smiles on the faces, and sometimes clearly legible reluctance.
There are races that fear that the soul will follow the screen and will never come to rest. The beloved body is made immortal by the intervention of a precious metal. According to Barthes, photography can be seen as a mythical denial of a fearful death feeling. By capturing a moment as alive as possible for real, one obtains the motionless and make-up face that we assign to the dead, the next beat of life then needs a new photo, and time is always overtaken by time. Who is not afraid of losing his silence? Many photographers had to promise to send the photos back over time so that they could get a rest on the people depicted.
The mission "A missionary stands among the black pagan idolaters as the lonely and exiled Hero, as a modern Robinson Crusoe who, armed with the cross, preaches and baptizes, teaches and heals." (Father van Rijckevorsel). In the victory of "civilization" over "barbarism," the will of God himself was widely seen. More than 100 years ago, the myth of the noble westerner who went to foreign countries to help progress became the main line of the colonial story. The missionaries themselves take the central, dominant place in the mission representations. Photographs serve as proof that colonization was not in fact a conquest, but rather a liberation from tyrannical rulers, paganism, poverty, diseases, isolation and general underdevelopment. Representatives of the local population do not appear on the images for: dignitaries, the elderly with authority, African priests or traditional healers, they cannot be found in missionary iconography unless they are isolated and branded as a demonic pagan. All the expertise and representatives of their own culture have been banned and eliminated. Thus sensible missionary depicted surrounded by children and rarely in the company of adults. The photos are reminiscent of a hero surrounded by his servants. Has that hero forgotten that he himself is a servant, ought to be God's?
Racism
The colonial and capitalist systems that grew up together are inevitably racist. The ideas about race are central to the justification of colonial rule. After the abolition of slavery, other ways must be found to use the land, resources and labor power of non-whites. The American constitution states after the abolition of slavery that a black person is only 3/5 of a white person. Which of course is the ideal way to justify racist practices.
The European looked a century ago with an evolutionary view of the rest of the world. Evolutionism explains the distinction between Westerners and the rest of the world's population as the gap between "civilized" and "primitives." The evolutionists saw a connection between the biological, external, characteristics of a person and his moral and intellectual nature. Non-European races were considered as a reflection of the human childhood, a phase that Europeans had already gone through in their prehistory. Because of these theories, science was seen as support for existing power relations and at the same time as a key to the history of whites.
Photography is used "scientifically" to legitimize the colonial presence. She is photographed in India the relationship between the colonial presence on the one hand and the civilization and progress of the country on the other. They wanted to show how modern European life in India was not. The "best" of Western civilization is exhibited. Photography itself is proof of this progress. Because "of course" photography - nobody is surprised - is a European invention that in the beginning mainly has white practitioners, who looked at the "natives" in different parts of the world with strikingly similar views. Discrimination and the stereotypical portrayal of people and races can even be found today (not just in photography).
Anthropological photography After the invention of photography, and under the influence of evolution, anthropology flourishes. This is not really strange as photography is ideally suited to the documentation of the human race and its differences. Due to the more permanent nature of the colonial presence of, for example, the Dutch in India and Suriname, interest in the indigenous population is growing. Knowing the colonized peoples is one of the fundamental forms of control and property names. Herman F.C. In an article "about anthropological research while traveling", Ten Kate provides instructions for taking photos for the benefit of anthropology. Researching other cultures without the use of a camera became almost unthinkable. People should be photographed as much as possible: - stripped of clothing and jewelry - full length or as a bust - in those positions; and face, and profile and from behind - often with a ruler next to it to indicate sizes.
If necessary, it should be possible to study the morphology and proportions only with the help of photographs. These photos, intended purely for science, show people as an interchangeable object, without any reference to the living conditions. To see humans as an object is undeniably derogatory. The goal of serving evolutionary theory reinforces this. According to one of those evolution theories, the homo sapiens is namely a descendant of the (human) monkey. They went looking for the "missing link". By this is meant the step that should have been within the evolution from ape to human. Negroes made that step a little smaller, according to European thinking. The Dutchman Herman Marie Bernelot Moens proposes to fertilize gorilla and chimpanzee females through artificial insemination with the seed of niggers to experimentally come to that "missing link". After all, it would go faster if "that rooted in the ground".
His plan - "The Truth, Experimental Investigations of the Descendants of Humans" - found wordy support from world-famous German biologist Ernst Haekel and financial support from, among others, the Dutch royal family. There was a lot of commotion about his plan and the biologist were diametrically opposed in their opinion as to whether or not it was ethical. Money, or in fact the lack of enough of it, was the reason that this project was never carried out. Moens’s plans to cross people with me monkeys were already obsolete. Why did his plan get so much attention from the press and scholars?
On the surface, this is about the difference between humans and monkeys. But emotionally the research looked for the identity of man, for the essence of human society and for the development of civilization. Philosophical and political consequences were attached to such an investigation. Finding the missing link would inversely prove that the indigenous peoples were at the bottom of the developmental step. The extinction of indigenous peoples who had come into contact with Europeans would be a tragic but inevitable natural happening. As was the case at the time when homo sapiens took office, other hominids died out, it was said that the lower must always give way to the higher.
After his wanderings through Europe, Moens himself ended up in the United States. There he had problems with, according to him, scientific photos of naked Negro girls. The girls' parents disagreed and filed a lawsuit. He then went to the door of other scientists to collect signatures and thereby prove that his photos had scientific values. After these problems, he immersed himself in the racial differences between people. He foresaw a racial war, and in his eyes it could only be prevented by inducing the best specimens of the different races to enter into relationships in order to create the perfect man.
The photo album Around the turn of the century (1900) it became clear that the photo catalog of all human species could not be obtained. People started to see the relative nature of photography, because the same scene with a different light and a different caption could evoke a completely different image. The photo generally lost the status of an unambiguous scientific fact, also among anthropologists. Large collections with "anthropological" photos of different races in non-scientific circles were created all over the world. These photos ended up in the family album. Part of the attraction was the creepy of the primitives where every European could feel like king of the world, and a related part to the common mix of the exotic with the erotic. These photos had specific characteristics that differed from the most common way of photographing in Europe. They showed large variations of poses artificially in "academic" spicy studies, in which an attempt was made to make people reach their best or most striking. The anthropological photos appeared in book form that many men bought under the guise of scientific interest. The taboo that raged on the photos of naked girls in Christian Europe was the reason that the colonial photographers felt morally called to give a responsible pseudo-scientific twist to the photos: "type ...".
Anthropology arranged the different varieties from low to high for a long time, with the color as the benchmark. The white, European race was at the top as highly civilized. The lower the step and the darker the house color, the less developed the person was and the closer he was to the monkey.
In Africa, for example, a clear distinction was made when photographing dark and less dark people. (again especially women). For example, a similar Fulani woman is not compared to a black woman like a pet, but more to a wild feline. She is flexible, graceful and intelligent. In black African women, the body received much attention and the face received little attention. with the Fulani woman it has been turned around exactly. The resemblance to the Negro woman is that she is also depicted as passive, expectant and uninitiated.
The evil eye
Within the colonial nude group, the woman is depicted stereotypically to European standards. The breasts are in focus and the body takes a graceful pose, the hands folded behind the head to accentuate the breasts. Other poses were revealing the chest and clothing partially or letting you slip completely off your body. A remarkable gesture that we encounter between the postcards from the African colony is to support one or both breasts or to clamp them with the hands. For a number of groups, this is a gesture to greet acquaintances. By offering the breasts with averted eyes, the woman in question indicates that she will not use the evil eye. This purport is not that of the postcards, which are clearly intended sexually. The model then presents her breasts, offers them and expresses her availability, in all likelihood not on her own initiative. The eyes are not necessarily averted. One could argue that the camera is the evil eye here.
"A quatre pattes"
Of all the photos from the colonies that have come to my eyes, there is one that knows how to keep my attention and that keeps shocking me. The photo I made of in a studio carries the caption: "A quatre pattes". Literally translated, that would be on 4 legs which is shocking in itself as a woman is depicted on the postcard. It is depicted as a symbol of animalism and lust. Thus the black woman was seen by the European, human, highly civilized man.
The black Africans, in appearance and moral character, would come very close to the animal through the vengeance of God, moreover they share the same landscape, namely the wilderness. The woman in the postcard, mischievously looking at the viewer, assumes the attitude of an animal. The breasts are uncovered. It is obvious that this photo was also taken for commercial purposes, to satisfy the sexual needs of the European man. These photos can be considered as the precursors of photos in magazines such as the Playboy. Yet this is not the reason that I am always shocked. It is the stamp placed by the postal services. The stamp as "approval" such as this happens with cattle and meat in our modern society. It is of course highly questionable whether that stamp was intentionally placed there by the postal worker. During the period that this card was sent, stamps and stamps were often placed on the side of the department in a corner. The fact remains that the card is now familiar to me with a stamp and can no longer be seen without it. The stamp has become part of the photo, the image.
Uwe Ommer
In the French "photo" of October 1992 there are pictures of Uwe Ommer. These photos clearly have the colonial postcards as a source of inspiration. It features naked, black women in graceful positions and each photo has a stamp with a stamp that shows where the photo would have been taken. Where the colonial post might become true-to-life, that is not possible in the case of Uwe Ommer's photographs. The background is always too brilliant in color and further consideration even tells us that only one girl has been the model. This is therefore a manipulation using the computer. The way the subject is depicted has similarities with the early postcards. In this way a breast is supported, a graceful posture is assumed and the hands are held behind the head, thereby accentuating the breasts and radiating sexuality. In a photo a woman sitting on a zebra is painted with a zebra pattern. This photo emphasizes alleged wildness and animalism and here too a certain sexual appearance cannot be denied. The photo that is said to be from Alaska shows two black women on a piece of ice "planting" an American flag by two white polar bears, indicating the difference between white and black. The captions with some photos such as "Miami Beach" and "somewhere in Saudi Arabia" should make the viewer believe that the situation as shown in the photo is realistic. Seen from the same light as the colonial nudes, these photos could be called discriminatory. Yet we are not immediately seen as such by us. This is probably because they make a not so strong link to the postcards of the past and are therefore justified, and are even considered aesthetically beautiful.
New pedigree
1921 is seen as the year in which the new pedigree was born. This year heralds a change in existing anthropology. Until then, anthropology was mainly limited to physical distinction, but from now on the spiritual characteristics will form the main thing. It was already known that a person has a soul, but that a race can also have a soul was innovative. One of the people who wrote about this, concerning the Aryan race, is Chamberlain. The coverage of his well-known two-part work. "Die grundlagen des 19 Jahrhunderts" is: to sketch the radiant highness of the Aryan-Northern race and the age-old German life form.
Hitler's strategy was entirely based on this new anthroplogy. From Mein Kampf: “Every blood belongs to one realm. The German people cannot assert any colonial-political claims, as long as it has not been able to bring their own sons into one state. Only when the state border also encloses the last German and the state no longer has the certainty to be able to feed all, does the moral right to acquire foreign land arise from the need of one's own people. "
But that says nothing about blacks in the German Empire. Blacks can hardly be found in the war stories. A number of times there is mention of the fact that the French deploy blacks in the front line, when it became really dangerous. In Europe they were not a major threat since they were only present in small numbers.
Nazi photography
Before the age of the computer, retouching was gratefully used to manipulate a photo as desired. Among other things, there have become well-known Nazi photographs depicting Jews as fat ore-smoking outgrowths of noisy poor people who endangered public health. Photography serves to categorize people, just as in early anthropology. It wasn't just about drawing comparisons and agreements. Based on the same logic or logic, suggested groups are assigned an inferior status. The Nazi race theory is an example of a total vision and photography served this lie. The Arian type was depicted with the help of photographs. On the basis of these photos, someone's origins were assessed and sentenced. In painting, comparisons were made between African masks and self-portraits of Jewish painters, both of whom were labeled inferior to the Aryan race. The Nazis also turned against dissolute Negro music. "Swing tanzen verboten". Military marches were considered more appropriate to bring joys to the people. Black influences such as those in jazz were not appreciated and black musicians were not tolerated.
De jazz
Jazz has made its breakthrough after WW I in the entire western world. These are years of social unrest with, among other things, racial riots in Chicago in 1919. The reclamation of America 1920-1932 brings fraternization that was characteristic of the jazz ambiance. The black entertainer following is not a threat to the status quo of the whites. They had to shape the white fantasies. The black entrance into the music world was a form of emancipation but within the limits of existing imaging. It meets the existing role pattern of the "happy negro". The now black artists are still wearing a mask. It was not that black were now assessed differently. Now really the gift awarded to great emotional expression, something feminine. This in contrast to the white masculinity. So still the same prejudices as 100 years before in the colonies. Childhood is also still blamed on black. It took until the 1930s before mixed bands, black and white, were generally accepted. During performances in Germany, the black members of the group had to stay home until the end of the war.
Baker
In Paris there was already a tradition of being interested in black art. If the black jazz dancer Baker performs there, it immediately gains admiration in Europe. "You introduce an instinctive exoticism with approaching everyday life, an erotically-tinted dance," references say. In Europe she could become famous because here, unlike the US, black women were scarce and therefore did not pose a risk to the social structure. This allowed it to be recognized that black women can be attractive. She performed, in the idea of an advertising draftsman, in a skirt with bananas. The Western European may be fascinated by the "wild", it must continue to meet the white fantasies and prejudices. Because of Baker, among others,the European cultural center moved to New York.
Western representation world
From Africa, wild nature depicted the wild beasts but not the cultural man-made world. This is Wild exotic Africa installed and advertised in the West and most visible is that the average Westerners were / are more familiar with African wildlife than with humans. On European postcards from Africa you can often see a European on the prowl on the point of unloading with decisive shot and each time flanked by a serviceable African. The safari is still a luxury sport.
In Western society again non-Westerners excluded from many professions. The choice, if any, was therefore limited. For example, virtually the only professions were open to negroes in the service sector, entertainment and sports. As a result, images of blacks as servants and entertainers are virtually the only appearances that my niggers encounter in the Western depiction world over a long period of time.
Black servants on portraits does not automatically mean that there are also servants involving the relevant family. Already in the 17th century the figure of the morse servant had become a style figure. It was added as decoration, contrast and color ornament, as image decoration and as extra luster.
The blacks were also incorporated into the white culture at the beginning of this century, as can be seen in a photo from 1905. The three boys are dripping with a western costume. This is part of the iconography that stands for service, submission and servility. The leftmost boy shows a slight bow that suggests submission. In the right-hand piccolo this is also depicted in the form of a bent knee as a reverence submission. Looking at the person being served, in this case the recipient / observer of the postcard, is also a symbol of service. The person being served can look away as is usually seen when both the servant and the servants are shown together. This indicates a physical distance and social distance, the difference in status. Finally, the black servant also laughs to indicate the emphasis on his service.
That blacks have become famous as entertainers or athletes is sometimes put forward as an argument that there is no discrimination. The first black figure did not become popular in modern Western culture was the minstrel; a white imitation of a black imitation of a satisfied lettuce. The stage of this white minstrel was the theater. In a minstrel show there was room for criticism of "washing out" slavery but not of slavery itself. These shows are a form of entertainment in America. With the arrival of the film, this familiar pattern of the minstrel show was initially continued. This popular entertainment, also in the film, was about the formation of popular stereotypes.
These figures were characterized by counterfeit upper-class clothing and pompous language. The free black that was mocked by the "ordinary" blacks. Simply seen through the eyes of the whites of course. The plot of these plays films was puncturing elitist pretensions. Because of the black masks, they are still whitening ie playing the role of blacks, a great freedom was afforded. Dot resulted in undermining the emancipation of blacks.
Used images of black men after 1948 are those of tough men like miners and workers. Relatively speaking, the images of workers are less prominent than images of black people such as servants, shoe polishers, waiters and especially domestic servants. Al si that in the 70s with the rise of black unions will change. Sport and the army are other areas in which Africans can manifest themselves under white management. Another striking image of Afrikaneen concerns the image of the "terrorist" often associated with the hammer and sickle of communism, propaganda material from the police.
The black Middle Class from Soweto, with a comfortable pattern of life, is portrayed in advertisements from advertising agencies. These images are more rosy than reality and based on aspirations. This is also the case in the South African film industry that serves blacks with fantasy images of black rambos and super men.
Postcards show the skyscrapers and prosperity of Johannesburg and Pretoria, but not the workers who built them. This image tries to make the majority of the South African population, the millions of African workers and miners invisible. Their housing cannot be found on postcards either. “If members of a particular ethnic group never see someone who really looks like them in advertisements, they develop a sense of being non-persons in society as a whole. They simply do not exist ". (Caol Nantharsan-Moog.) This does not only apply to South Africa but also to ghetto populations in America.
Sport
Sport had traveled to the new world with the Africans and played integrated in the middle of the last century. After that the sport was regularly regulated and when the race separation started the sport was also branded physically inferior.
Blacks made their comeback at the beginning of this century. Racial competition gave a new exciting dimension painted by, among others, Israel's 1914-1915 "the Negro Boxer". The Dadaists considered black and white boxing matches as dada happenings. The language of the "politique des races" is nowadays also fully visible on sports pages. The success of blacks in sports confirms the prejudice of the bestial brute.
Jesse Owens, who won gold four times at the 1936 Munich Olympics, belied Nazi theory with his victory. Moreover, he refused to give the Hitler salute.
Tommie Smith and John Carlos winners at the 200 meters in Mexico in 1968 bowed the head and gave the black power salute. That's why they were kicked out of the American Olympic team. The photos that were taken at the time of the greeting can be found in all history books.
But for how long will photos serve the truth? The question that of course always existed around photography, but with the arrival of the computer it has become very topical again. The same photo of the 2 aforementioned athletes, after the intervention of the computer, gets a completely different twist. The hands are raised until the greeting has been removed, leaving two athletes, who are almost guilty, looking down
Information
Children are still often shown in idealistic education. They are simply disarming. Collection campaigns by aid organizations and idealistic information about Africa often fall back on stereotypes. Children's appeal and the victim image of Africa are among the clichés of the genre. The predominant image of Africa is an image of hunger, natural disasters and political troubles, an image of danger, setback and apathy. This terror is often exacerbated in the press by the choice of photographs, which are often taken in such a way that people look down on them literally, which reinforces the impression of passivity. The assisting authorities are largely responsible for this. They choose the image that is most useful to them, but that is not necessarily the correct image. The campaigns not least sustain the organizations themselves, while the media use them to broadcast cheap, predictable and confirming images. In the representations, the abnormal is the norm; war, disaster, famine, coup and popular uprising have been exported to the non-western world while they still exist in the western world (see Yugoslavia).
People get tired of all sorts of aid agencies that bring bad news and ask for more money to help those in need. That is why there is now a wave of "positive advertising". An example of this is "the good new thing is that music sounds again in the Sahel, we must all try to prevent the bad news" from Novib.
Advertisement
The most important question with regard to present-day commercial imaging is to what extent stereotypes are prolonged and confirmed or, on the contrary, broken. Often the schedules are broken by, for example, depicting a black man as an equal. By then adding a saxophone it reminds us of the black entertainer. Unknowingly using and thinking in stereotypes is part of the problem. The use of exotic attributes and ethnic features in advertising has not diminished in advertising in recent years, but complexity and ambiguity have increased. The spectrum of ways in which blacks are represented has become wider.
In the popular culture of the 1950s, plenty of cannibal humor is still used. In the former colonial countries, the image of Africa became a politically sensitive matter, while in countries that did not have any relations with Africa, the existing stereotypical image has so far been outlawed. In the 60s and 70s, derogatory images are coming back. Blacks are no longer presented as service figures but also as emblem for beauty, grace and elegance. Images of blacks increase in advertising and are more assertive. Images of integration come into circulation. In Europe, most clichés about blacks are prolonged indefinitely due to great success. After the commercial manipulation of these images had temporarily declined, the 1980s again saw a comeback of these images.
Blacks have now virtually disappeared from advertisements of soap, polishes and ink, but the Moor still exists as an emblem for breweries and cafes in North West Europe. They can also be found on the candy packaging. With the revival of past style periods, the attributes used at that time also come back. The black clerk as can be seen at many entrances to cafés is an example of this.
Prostitution
Picasso saw the sensuality of the woman as a visual analogy of the blacks. He has rendered this impressionistic in Les Demoiselles d 'Avignon (1907). He made use of African masks and thereby made the link. The black woman was therefore also sexualized by him and put on a par with prostitutes. What is different is his convincing attitude towards prostitution; no longer being so hostile and found to be criminal. Baudelaire also associated the black woman with darkness "child of the midnight", but he found darkness to be integral. That the sexualized image of blacks is still intact confirms the increased import of non-Western and black prostitutes.
A market for blacks has also emerged in other areas with advertising targeted at them, in particular the consumer and labor market. They are normally displayed on this without existing stereotypes. Examples of these advertisements are the Postbank, State Lottery, the Municipal Police and the Dutch Railways. The advertisements are aimed at young consumers and show mixed pairs where integration and assimilation are symbolized. By using the product one gets closer to the integration. It is not suggested that the product is adapted to the requirements of the black market. An association is established between the product and blacks which means that blacks come to the product and not vice versa. In other words; the standards remain those of the white middle classes.
Fashion
The spectrum of images of blacks has widened significantly in recent years. A recent development is that black men act as models in fashion advertisements and not just as decoration. Ethnicity is also not important in the Grolsch advertisement. The young black beer drinker with rasta haircut is not stereotyped. In one winner-shag advertisement we see young black dressed in elegant costume with an air of the superior connoisseur, but building on existing images.
The general pattern indicates a reproduction of stereotypes in combination with a gradual broadening of the repertoire. That these commercials are effective is evident from the fact that non-Western cultures that have hardly any experiences with black people use the same stereotypes; countries like Japan for example.
The aforementioned Benneton advertisement of the black boy as a devil and the angelic white girl is just one of the advertisements on which there was fierce protest. This is because the black was associated with the devil. That thought will find a comfortable place in the subconscious of the whites among all the other negative stereotypes that still exist.
Benneton's advertising man O.Toscani says that the black boy was supposed to look like a little devil, but because both the girl and the boy laugh angelically, the viewer would be confused. The intention is to propagate the harmony between people. Benneton says he absolutely does not want to provoke with their photos. But to bring a new form of advertising because the traditional publicity does not suffice. People do not sell clothing but a vision of life. They want to bring stimulating photos and thereby fight against the indifference. The question is of course whether they will not go too far. In 1989, they also embarrassed the anger of the black community in the United States, with a photo depicting a black woman feeding a white child. This evokes images from the time of slavery when black women also had to feed white children. The image of a black and a white arm riveted together with a handcuff does not go down well either. Although both men are dressed identically, the impression is created that the black man would have been arrested by the white man. How ironic it is, since the campaign is intended to express the similarity between black and white.
Couples
Nowadays, the image of mixed couples can often be found in advertising. Hereby the existing pattern is often maintained, especially in dominance patterns male versus female and black versus white. To what extent do the photos that have appeared in advertisements in recent years satisfy those stereotypes? Should we not first comment on this question that everything is increasingly being sold with sex or at least with romance? The product is sold on the basis of a story that seems to have had nothing to do with the product, or even worse, on the basis of beautiful images in which the story is hard to find. With this information in mind somewhere I want to talk about a few images from the fashion advertising world.
"Pardon, wear it and be beautifull" is the title of a poster with a mixed, nude couple on it. We are not asked here to walk around naked since it is an advertisement for the fashion house “Sisly”. What we have to wear will always remain the question, but these posters nevertheless sold like sweet cakes. So it was found beautiful by the public anyway. Another place where the poster ended up was in the "White over black" exhibition. Nobody was able to see it there since it was already removed before the opening after the intervention of the photographer. He did not have it removed because of “the negative, accusatory tendency of the exhibition that propagates that blacks were abused by whites and advertisements, but because he believes that he did not participate in it. It just has 2 people on it; one white and one black ”.
Would a permanent place in this exhibition have been justified or not? Prejudice teaches us that a black man has a service function compared to the white woman. Otherwise he has a decorative reason for his presence. The photo of the poster could be explained as serving by the position of the black hand. What if the hand of the woman were? Even then, the meaning that can be given to the photo would be the same. If that hand is decisive for the appearance of the image, then the logical third question. Yes, the sensual tendency, as mentioned earlier, used today to sell, stands with the presence of that hand. The man is not placed here in the background or in a clearly inferior position. Another stereotype is that the emphasis is placed on male body strength. The man photographed here is indeed very muscular, but also the body of the woman is clearly hardened by sport, and not squeezed into an extremely graceful, feminine angle. The emphasis is on beauty, grace and elegance.
A sexual appearance is very present but comes from both sides. The last important question is of significance here is the skin color, apart from the fact that contradictions always work well. It is not that it is predominant. Yet 2 whites or 2 blacks would have yielded an image of a different meaning. Mixed couples suspect a world-class company or at least an open mind.
In this age of neo-Nazism, the use of a mixed pair is a form of positive propaganda. Benneton is just one of the companies that makes heavy use of mixed couples and new developments in world news to fill their own stock market.
Another photo with a mixed pair comes from the Olmar winter collection 1990. She shows a dressed white woman, thus selling fashion, and a undressed black man in a more decorative position. The only thing he sells is the sensuality that comes from the photo. This sensuality is enhanced by the places where her hands and his right foot are located. One of the previously mentioned stereotypes is that the difference in skin color should not be made too large in order not to shock too much. Although the difference in skin color is quite large, this is virtually eliminated here because her clothing has almost the same gray value as his skin color. The posture of the man clearly radiates masculinity, but in the line of the woman; the way her right hand takes his head can be interpreted as possessive. The look of the fold, not looking at him, also contributes to her feminine position that reinforces his masculine position. The man is clearly the servant here, and this partly destroys his masculine attitude. Color and sex hierarchies are produced in this image rather than broken.
As the next photo I have a perfume advertisement that stares at me every day when I'm at any Dutch train station. It shows 2 white people of which the woman is dressed in contrast to the man again. What is the reason the man is not wearing clothes? Does he no longer need it as long as he uses the good aftershave, is the aftershave attractive to the woman even without clothing or does the aftershave undress the man? Whatever the case, here too a product is sold with the help of sensuality, whether or not it is interpreted as such by me.
In contrast to the previous photo, the man and the woman look at each other here and the allusion to sex is therefore much more direct and neither of them is subordinate to the other. The man is not typically depicted as a male, no emphasis has been placed on physical strength, but rather on a relationship in which the man and woman are equal. If the man had been black now, it would probably have been more written here that he was more or less submissive, serving the woman. From this I could draw the conclusion that we nowadays look at discrimination with prejudice. It is very easy to find reasons that indicate that there is discrimination.
Still, there are also photos to be found within the advertising world that clearly are. As a last picture I therefore chose the Seiko advertisement on which a black wearer holds up a white, clearly sexually available woman. The man exudes an almost beastly power and literally serves to hold the woman up. It is not necessary to argue about whether or not stereotypes are met here because that is clear anyway.
Epilogue
I have not talked too much about discrimination in this thesis, but more about using stereotypes. I did this because in my opinion "this is discrimination" is being called too quickly. The strange thing is that this is often done by us "whites". This was also the case with my own photos "while blacks came to me because they were curious about how they would look" white ", the whites were already saying it was discrimination.
During the writing of this thesis, I started to pay more attention to viewing photos in newspapers, magazines and books. It was really surprising that the way in which blacks are depicted and stood was not changed all in all. Most of the images are certainly not repulsive, but sometimes even aesthetically fantastic. Black photographers make the same images themselves, but I notice that they make more portraits without fuss and attributes.
References
BARTHES, Ronald. 1988. de Lichtende kamer (Camera Lucida) Amsterdam: Single Uitgevers.
BLIKOPENER. 1991. no 5
CORBEY, Raymond H.A. 1989. Wildheid en beschaving De Europese verbeelding van Afrika. Amsterdam; Ambo
EVANS, David. 1987. Photomontage: A Political Weapon, Gordon Fraser.
GROENEVELD, Anneke and Paul FABER. 1989. Toekan Portret -100 jaar fotografie in Nederlands Indië 1839 - 1939. Amsterdam, Rotterdam Museum voor Volkenkunde.
GROENEVELD, Anneke and Paul FABER. 1991. Fotografie in suriname 1839-1939. Amsterdam.
GROENE AMSTERDAMMER. 29-5-1991
HET PAROOL 4-12-1991 and 26-9-1922 pag 3. Amsterdam
HITLER, Adolf. 1933. Mein Kampf (Dutch translation)
HULKEMA, Dr. G. W.. 1942. Ras en toekomst. 2nd Edn. Amsterdam: Keurkamer.
McELROY, Keith 1992. Pop. education and photographs of te non-industrialised world -1885-1915 Exposure Volume 28, number 3. University of Colorado. Availabe at: https://www.spenational.org/files/store/products/pdf-high/SPE_Exposure_1991-92_winter_28_3.pdf
P/F. 1992. nr 7. about E.s. Curtis. Amsterdam
ROOY, Piet de and Sierk PLANTINGA. 1991. Op zoek naar volmaaktheid : H.M. Bernelot Moens en het mysterie van afkomst en toekomst. Houten: De Haan.
SCHAEVERS, Mark. 1983 (translation) De wereld in zwart-wit - geschiedenis van het racisme. Leuven: Kritak.
SCHUFELDT, R. W. ca1915 - America's Greatest Problem: The Negro. Philadelphia, F. A. Davis Available at: https://archive.org/details/americasgreatest00shuf/page/n10/mode/2up [assecced on 3 March 2020]
SCHULTE NORDHOLT,J.W. 1961. - Rassendiscriminatie. Amsterdam: De arbeiderspers.
VOLKSKRANT. 16-2-1991, 6-1-1990 pag 35. Amsterdam
VRIJ NEDERLAND. 5-10-1991 pag 85 and 17-4-1993 pag. 92. Amsterdam
Exhibitions
Memoria Del Tiempo Tropen museum Amsterdam
Museum for ethnology Amsterdam- Martin Chambi
Museum for ethnology Rotterdam - the other way of seeing
Museum for ethnology Rotterdam - Odagot
Teylers museum Haarlem - 10 books of E.S. Curtis
Images found this time
JONES, Ann. 2012. Taking an average. Article about Nancy Burdon. Available at:https://imageobjecttext.com/2012/04/24/taking-an-average/ [assecced on 3 March 2020]
MILLER, Mike. Available at: http://mikemillerphoto.com/advertising/ [assecced on 3 March 2020]
NEDERVEEN PIETERSE, Jan. 1991. Wit over zwart, Beelden van Afrika en zwarten in de westerse populaire cultuur. Available at: https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/nede008wito01_01/nede008wito01_01_0005.php [assecced on 3 March 2020]
OMMER, Uwe. Available at https://www.uweommer.eu/# [assecced on 3 March 2020]
US Slave. 2011. Available at: http://usslave.blogspot.com/2011/10/black-bodies-white-science-louis.html [assecced on 3 March 2020]
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