Vernacular Photography

Vernacular photography is the creation of photographs that take everyday life and common things as subjects.
                                                                                              (source: wikipedia)
source: google images
Walker Evans

  • He took up photographs in 1928
  • He documented the Great Depression and worked for FSA (Financial Services Authority)
  • His goal was to make pictures that are 'literate, authoritative, transcendent.'
  • Vernacular photography doesn't focus on people. Ordinary places can be artistically framed too.


source: google images
In his photography he addresses the impacts of the Depression like big government take over and loss of individual purchasing power and independence, even though this reflects his images with a harsh definition of America as fragmented and corrupt. (source: walkerevansphotography.blogspot.co.uk)

"Photography seems to be the most literary of the graphic arts."
                             - Walker Evans



Martin Parr
source: google images
  • He is known for projects that are intimate and satirical
  • He is famous for documenting social classes
  • Vernacular photography can have the effect of making the ordinary somewhat 'creepy'
source: google images

Vernacular photography can include personal memories, the passing of time, etc and there is a double distortion between the photographer and the viewer.
Also, it uses aesthetics because of the human instinct to take aesthetically pleasing pictures.
Vernacular photography can use symmetry, rule of thirds and diagonal but it is not seen as professional as it uses 'everyday language' and has to do with ordinary people.



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