Richmond, California  c. 1942 - 1965

Dorothea Lange made this black and white photograph, Richmond, California. In it, we see a mass of people, mostly men in hats, walking towards us. It’s kind of a grey world, isn’t it? Not just in color, but in mood. Look at the guy in the front with the pipe; there's a mix of weariness and determination there, right? All of these faces, all these lives converging—there's a real texture in those faces, etched by experience. And it’s all captured in this silvery tone, almost ghostly. Lange did a lot of documentary work, especially during the Depression. You see that sense of social realism here too, like you can almost smell the desperation and the hope all mixed together. Think of the raw honesty of Walker Evans. In both, there’s a similar sense of capturing a moment that's both specific and universally human. It’s like she’s saying, "Here, look. Don't turn away."