Tuesday, November 29, 2011

About the Project

I recently visited Clark Planetarium in Salt Lake City with a friend and. One of their popular displays is called Newton's Daydream. This display resembles one of those old gumball machines that sends your gumball racing through an elaborate track before releasing it for your chewing pleasure. The machine is two stories tall and has multiple tracks with ramps, weights, pulleys, wheels, and other doo-dads and what-nots for the golf balls to cycle through.


For added fun, there are levels and wheels that extend from inside the machine to the outside where small hands can participate in the fun by altering the courses of the balls. As I found myself entranced by the bells and whistles of the display, I watched a small child, no more than three or four years old, grab one of these levers and begin playing with it. It was not long at all before he realized exactly what that lever did, what he could control, and began to alter the paths of the balls on the track. What was truly fascinating was the look on his face as he got an idea, made a plan, and patiently began waiting, focusing for a good ten minutes while he let the balls build up so he could release them all at once.

How many adults, dragging their children for a "fun" day at the planetarium, stop to observe this miraculous display with more than a glance? How few children wouldn't be entertained for hours watching for where the next golf ball will land and searching for its point of origin? What many adults would spend the time to play with the wheels and levers after quickly discovering their function? How few children wouldn't gather their peers to try pulling all the levers at once?

This is precisely the purpose of this project. Children see things differently than adults. They are absorbed by simple joys and pleasures. To an adult, this machine is a mathematical equation - quickly solved and forgotten. To a child, this machine is a brand new discovery - fascinating, complex, eye-catching, and worth testing over and over again. How different would a photographer's perspective be if he could discover the world around him as if it were brand new every single day? The way a child does?


Monday, November 21, 2011

Eli, Age 5


These were taken by 5 year old on an iphone. What do you think? Post a comment!







Tuesday, November 1, 2011

About the Project

Jacques-Henri Lartigue, a renowned photographer of the twentieth century, was given his first camera in 1904 at the age of eight. He had already been experimenting with his father's camera for two years. Some of Lartigue's most famous and most fascinating photographs are the snapshots he took in those early years. These images show typical daily events in his life from the non-subjective, innocent, and spontaneous perspective of a child. 

Lartigue's photographs are a unique insight into childhood vision, for a child will take a camera places an adult never would, and capture things an adult of the time would not consider photogenic.




Perhaps the most intriguing insight of Lartigue's vision is the way he captures the things that are most important to him. His photograph, "In My Room" is no cheap shot of his childhood play things, but a captivating image of his precious toys, as if he is about to begin playing with them.


In a time when the arts are quickly becoming less valued as a part of standard education, it is easy to forget the power it can wield in the hands of a child. In reality, art is not just about creating something beautiful. It is about opening the mind to creative expression, interpretation, and problem solving. By that definition, everything is an art, including math, science, and language. As Dana Gioia once said, "The real purpose of arts education is to create complete human beings capable of leading successful and productive lives in a free society."(Stanford Commencement, 2007)


Through this project we hope to establish a database of images taken by children that will serve as evidence on the power of the availability of art in a child's life. We do not expect these photographs to be incredible works of art, but we do believe that we will all be surprised by the things that children choose to photograph compared to what we would expect from an adult in the same situation. In that way, we do expect these photographs will be profound.

To participate, simply hand a camera to a child for the course of a day, or for one event. We are looking for submissions from children between the ages of 3 and 12. Please send your photographs to giveachildacamera@gmail.com along with the child's name and age. Photographs will be published to this blog. By submitting photographs, you are granting permission for the publication of the photographs to this blog. Any further publication will be prefaced by further permission by the submitter.

As our collection grows, be sure to keep up on new images, feel free to comment on what you see, and pass the word along to friends so they can follow and participate as well.