PICTURE MAN - THE POETRY OF PHOTOGRAPHER MILTON ROGOVIN

Half a century ago, one year after a vicious attack by the House of Un-American Activities Committee had devastated his optometry practice and silenced his voice, Milton Rogovin picked up a camera for the first time. He was 48 years old. “My voice was essentially silenced,” says Rogovin," So I decided to speak out through photograghs."

Miton Rogovin (born in 1909) is one of the nation’s most accomplished social documentary photographers, although until now he has remained virtually unknown outside of his hometown of Buffalo, New York.

He began shooting photographs of storefront African American churches with the help his wife, Anne Rogovin. He continued to shoot working people in Buffalo and around the world with his wife’s financial support. In 1972, he shot his most significant work ,just a few blocks away from his optometric office. They consisted of portraits of the Lower West Side, one of Buffalo’s poorest communities.

At the age of 83, after overcoming heart surgery and prostate cancer he continued to shoot the streets of the Lower West Side. In 1997, Rogovin developed cataracts in both eyes. In 1999, he restored his eyesight through surgery and continued to take pictures. (Democracy Now)

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DAILY DOSE OF ROGOVIN

Joseph Kemp, Hanna Furnace, Buffalo, NY

SNAKE HANDLER FAITH

Grasshopper Valley, Tenn -- Lewis Ford is shown as he drapes a rattlesnake about the neck of a fellow member of his congregation at the Dolly Pond Church of God (1945

DAILY DOSE OF ROGOVIN

Mother and children, Sunday Communion, 1972

AS THE RUIN FALLS (C.S.LEWIS)

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains

MILTON ROGOVIN

I had never heard of this man before this afternoon. His website proclaims him to be a social documentary photographer. Much of his work is focused on the East and West side of Buffalo, NY IN THE 1950S. I'm going to be writing more about this man over the next little while, but for now, here is a sample of his work from "Milton Rogovin: The Forgotten Ones."