Marc Riboud, an introduction to A - Level Media

In todays lesson (Wednesday September 7th), we decided to look at photographer Marc Riboud's representations of society to introduce ourselves to the A Level Media Course. We covered aspects of the four key concepts: Representation, Media Language, Audiences and Institutions. We studied the photographs of Marc Riboud as his obituary had recently appeared in the Times, we deconstructed the representation of a 16 year old girl holding up a flower to ranks of armed US soldiers positioned as if to strike against her. The picture was taken in Washington in 1967, during the Vietnam War.





In the image, a young girl wearing floral pattern clothing is seen holding up a flower in a wide shot, whilst a barrage of soldiers pointing bayonet-like weapons towards her. One significant detail that I noticed in the photograph is the quality of the image, with the girl being depicted in crystal clear camera quality, which contrasts the soldiers she is facing, who are all depicted in relatively low resolution and picture quality. This connotes that Riboud is drawing a parallel between war and peace. The 'peacekeeping' girl is clear and refined whereas the 'warmongering' soldiers are skewed and unclear, which outlines Riboud's attitudes that war is always unclear and flawed, whereas peace involves clarity and a consistent aim. The blur of the soldiers in the image can also be considered to be soldiers represented as nameless and faceless, thus linking to the futility of war and the mass loss of life. The flower that the girl is holding is a heavy contrast to the weaponry held by the soldiers, as the flower represents innocence and life as opposed to the death surrounded by the weaponry.