Disturbing Similarity

Larry Fink Paris, France January 1996

Nicholas Nixon, Tom Moran January 1988

I have to say- there is a disturbing similarity between Fink's runway photos and Nixon's photographs of AIDS patients.

Nicholas Nixon, Tom Moran October 1987

Larry Fink Christian LaCroix Haute Couture, Paris, France, January 1996

Surely I'm not the only one who sees this.

Links: Nixon 1, Nixon 2, Fink 1, Fink 2

Depictions of the Elderly

Larry FinkNice, France July 1988

I came across this photo of Fink's, and was struck by the turn that it takes (at least in my mind) of his depiction of ordinary people. I posted earlier about his photos of families not being as intimate, as soft as Nixon's, but this photo changes my mind somewhat.

Nixon's most famous photos of the elderly depict patients in nursing homes, all seemingly in their last few days of life. There is a certain amount of truth to this, in confronting the issue of death in this way (he has certainly dealt with the issue in several projects over the years), but the photos are a little harsh, lacking in compassion perhaps. Fink's photo shows more hope, more life than Nixon's depictions of the elderly generally do.

Nicholas Nixon C.C., Boston, 1983

Links: Fink, Nixon

Comparing Family Photos

Nicholas Nixon, Bebe and Sam (1995)

I was looking through Nixon's photos of his family, and Fink's photos of the Sabatine family at the birthday parties, and noticed something. While Fink's photos are certainly more candid than Nixon's, they seem far less intimate. He seems to have photographed as an outsider, peeking in at another family's celebration (which very well may be what he did). Nixon's photos of his family (in general) seem very posed, but yet they retain a sense of intimacy that Fink's photos of the birthday parties lack. Even in Fink's photo of himself with his daughter(?) Molly, the effect is harsh, quite unlike the softness of Nixon's photos.

Larry Fink, Self with Molly (1982)

Nicholas Nixon, Clem with Bebe (1996)

Links: Nixon, Fink 1, Fink 2

School

In the mid to late nineties, both Larry Fink and Nicholas Nixon published photos of grade school classrooms/students.

Larry Fink Cleveland School of the Arts 1998

Larry Fink Cleveland High School of the Arts 1995

Nicholas Nixon, from School 1998

Nicholas Nixon, from School 1998

Nixon spent nearly a year photographing at various schools, including Perkins School for the Blind and the Tobin School, among several others. This collection of photos was published in the book School in 1998 (coauthored by Robert Coles), and has become some of Nixon's most famous work.

Fink's photos were taken over the course of several years, and are often overlooked in favor of his more theatrical works.

Nixon, People With AIDS

In 1986, Nicholas Nixon and his wife, Bebe, began the People With AIDS project in 1986. They intended to show honestly and compassionately what it is like to have AIDS, and how the disease affects family and friends of those afflicted. They wished to demonstrate why AIDS is "the most devastating social and medical issue of our time."



The most famous photographs in this series are those of Thomas Moran (above), though fourteen other individuals suffering from AIDS were also photographed.



When it was first shown in 1988, the series of work was seen as "one of the first and most controversial mainstream art exhibits on AIDS, becoming a kind of standard by which to measure dehumanizing, degrading representations of the disease." Several rights groups vehemently protested the photographs, stating that it only showed the negative side of AIDS, that it only showed death and despair. These groups wanted more diverse and more positive representations of people with the disease.

Today, however, this series is seen as historically important; they are described as a stark contrast to the abundance of images of happy and healthy people with AIDS. Perhaps they're a warning of the pain caused by the disease, or perhaps they were simply a documentation of a few people's lives.