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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery Three: Expressing human values > Under the Baskets, Luang Prabang Market, Laos, 2005
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22-JAN-2005

Under the Baskets, Luang Prabang Market, Laos, 2005

A mother clutches her sleeping child while waiting for baskets to be unloaded at Luang Prabang's market. Of all the images I made on this trip, this one reflected the greatest sense of responsibility. A mother must protect her children, care for them, and provide for them. This woman is doing all three here. She works in this market, and whatever may be in those baskets, or perhaps just the baskets themselves, must be essential to her livelihood. The truck that towers over her is overloaded with baskets – she seems overwhelmed by their massive scale. It gives the feeling that the world as she knows it is closing in on her. She was one of many people waiting for those baskets to be unloaded. Her embrace is extremely protective. Her determined expression implies that somehow she will endure. Threat, responsibility, protection, care, and endurance are all human values, and I tried to put them all into this image.

Canon PowerShot G6
1/400s f/4.0 at 11.2mm hide exif
Full EXIF Info
Date/Time22-Jan-2005 07:58:25
MakeCanon
ModelCanon PowerShot G6
Flash UsedNo
Focal Length11.2 mm
Exposure Time1/400 sec
Aperturef/4
ISO Equivalent
Exposure Bias
White Balance (-1)
Metering Modemulti spot (3)
JPEG Quality (6)
Exposure Programshutter priority (2)
Focus Distance

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Phil Douglis29-Jul-2006 05:36
Good question, Emi. I liked the closed eyes -- to me, their were closed because of exhaustion, and that told my story. I also got low and shot upwards to stress the towering baskets overhead that are important context for this picture. It works for me as it is --any other vantage point I might have taken would have weakened this idea.
Guest 29-Jul-2006 02:15
The woman sure looks like sleeping( her eyes are closed with as your vantage point was low), I wouldnt have noticed she was awake if I didnt read your caption. Wouldnt it be better if you change your vantage point a little so that we can see better of her eyes?

Emi
Phil Douglis24-Jun-2005 19:42
The Canon G6 has a flip-out rotating LCD viewfinder, which allows me to hold the camera below waist level for such shots. And yes, she is sitting down. Waist level shooting at right angles to the subject is much less obtrusive than holding a camera up in front of my face. The flip out viewfinder does double duty here -- it allows me to shoot from low down, as well as to become an almost invisible photographer.
Guest 11-Jun-2005 09:29
hi phil

Could i ask you on your vantage point? this lady seems to be setting down with her chin raised. It seems to me that for you to capture this shot, you must be stooping very low putting your camera at ground level and shooting up?

Cheers

sam
Phil Douglis28-May-2005 00:12
You are more than welcome, Jing. You can only learn by asking good questions, and you know how to ask them. Thank you for contributing to the cyberbook.
Jing 27-May-2005 20:44
I think I understand better now, thxthx for your explain. :)
Phil Douglis27-May-2005 02:53
Thanks, Jing, for the question. You see the human values here, right? I list them in my caption. I also say in the caption that she seems overwhelmed by the massive scale of the baskets. That is called scale incongruity. You can read more about scale incongruity in the many examples I have of it in my Incongruity Gallery. As for abstraction, look at the child. It is there but not there. It is turned away from us, therefore abstracted. It is not described, only implied. We don't know if these baskets are empty or full, do we? Anytime we remove information from a picture, we ask the viewer to use their own imaginations to fill it in. That's what I do here, Jing.

As for the clipping of the baskets, I wanted the top basket to brush the top of the image to imply that they are reaching for the sky. Although we can see that they end there, the touching is a symbol for continuation. They make us feel as if the odds are stacked against her, and by implying continuation, they see even more overwhelming. The clipping of the mother is also intentional, because she seems to be almost slipping out of the picture, a symbol for retreat and withdrawal. Once again, I don't actually show her leaving. I merely imply that she seems defeated and ready to withdraw.

Not everyone will read what I read here, which is fine. Each viewer will make his or own image out of mine. That's how expressive photography works. But I did want you to know why I did what I did.
Hope this helps,
Phil
Jing 26-May-2005 21:12
HiHi,

When I first saw this photo, I wondered why it was shot vertical, rather than horizontal (including the immediate baskets, but not the ones on level 2nd). I looked at this for a little while, before reading your comment (to see what I can get from it myself) and before read other comment. I did not get it hahaha.

After I read Clara comment (and your comment to her) I finally got the idea. And now i see why include all basket as vertical photo work better. (just too bad top most basket is clipped, as is her body, in my opinion).

I know you have said before that good photo require 3 item: incongruity, human value, and abastract. Is this photo only to have 1 of the 3 (human value)? I ask because I do not fully see abstrat and incongruity parts.
Phil Douglis09-Mar-2005 18:46
To see this image as a microcosm of this woman's condensed existence is extremely perceptive, Clara. This is why I made this photograph as I made it -- this is really her world. I am not sure if these are her own baskets or owned by others, but she certainly seemed to be linked to them.
Guest 09-Mar-2005 15:21
I also see her attitude of ownership to the baskets. Yes, much of her world is condensed in such little space.
Phil Douglis07-Mar-2005 19:30
I agree. The color is critical to meaning here for that very reason. This image is based on the human value of protection, and the colors make it come through.
Tim May07-Mar-2005 17:40
I respond to the color, especially the fact the the child is wrapped in pink and held to the heart. It is as if the woman protection is letting the child grow.
Phil Douglis04-Mar-2005 17:57
You are right, Dandan. A good lesson learned -- in order to express an idea well, you must emphasize or stress those parts of the image that carry the most meaning. In this case, it's all about a mother-child relationship. In your desire to make this image seem more dramatic by converting it to black and white, you would have added mood but obscured the child, thereby throwing out the baby with the bath. (Pun intended.)
Guest 04-Mar-2005 10:23
Yes, Phil, the smaller head of the child in B&W, made her too secondary! From this exercise and a few comments you left on my pictures, another valuable lesson, you really need to stress the character that you would to tell the story about. Thanks!
Phil Douglis01-Mar-2005 04:12
I wondered the same thing, Dandan. I made the conversion to check it out. You can do this too if you want, by just dragging this image off pbase and on to your desktop and converting it in Photoshop. The black and white version sucks the warmth right out of the mother. It is cold and grim. Dramatic, yes. But it has changed meaning, making the most important human value -- protection -- seem more distant and chilling. The child also tends to merge with the mother in black and white. We we can still see it, but we don't sense its vulnerability as much as when we see it in its pink clothing. What do you think?
Guest 28-Feb-2005 16:49
Phil, I think this one is very touching and powerful on expressing the human values. I am just wondering would this one be a good candidate for B&W, to make the story more dramatic.
Phil Douglis27-Feb-2005 20:49
Thanks, Anna, for this reponse. Yes, this picture asks a lot of questions of the viewer and demands a lot of answers. I saw a mother's need to protect her child as the prime human value here, but as I said in my caption, there are many other possible interpretations, also based on human values, that are at work here as well.

There is another image on pbase that carries a similar emotional tone. It Jen Zhou's Migrant Mother picture at:http://www.pbase.com/angeleyes_zyl/image/32210561 . Jen says she is expressing hope in her photograph, but I also see that same protective urge, in the face of threat, that is present in my image. I am glad you ask so many hypothetical questions here, Anna. That was what I had hoped this picture would do.
Phil Douglis27-Feb-2005 20:40
Glad to get this comment, Mo. There is slightly ominous quality to this image. I would like to think that those baskets symbolize something important to her life, but on the other hand, they may also symbolize the odds that my be stacked against her in terms of economic comfort.
Anna Yu27-Feb-2005 17:29
Small humans dwarfed by the oncoming tide, represented by the baskets. A contrasting color in the clothes. A symbolic picture which can be interpreted in many different ways. Where is her husband? Is she in pain? Is the burden of making a livelihood too overpowering for her?
monique jansen27-Feb-2005 09:01
Scale incongruity works here. The baskets seem to be threatening her and her child, yet on the other hand may provide in her livelihood, we do not really know. They are precariously stacked and yet she is sitting right underneath them, so they must be important to her.
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