Narrative photography is a format of photography that enables you to create your own story and outcome through a staged image. ‘Today in the digital age new stories and narratives can be created with the revival of the tableau photograph.’ (Van De Velde, 2011). Tableau is a display technique that uses mise-en-scene to represent a story or narrative. In narrative photography the photographer acts as the director giving hints to how you can read the story through the way they display the image. The director, photographer, creates the mise-en-scene to how they wish to portray a certain scenario. An example of this is the way the director may hint what point the film still might represent in the narrative, the beginning middle or end. Todorov’s theory shows the process in which a story unfolds starting with an equilibrium then a type of distribution occurs and ending with a new equilibrium. (Raham, p4.)
Crewdson photographed a number of created film stills to films that didn’t exist. One of these photos shows a pregnant women standing on the side of the road as a car is driving past her. Taking todorovs theory I believe that this film still is the first equilibrium, before any disruption has taken place. The director has given us hints into what kind of day this narrative is taken place by the foggy mist alongside the blue sky in the background suggesting that this is early morning. There are also several hints suggesting that this film still is taken before a disruption, as there are many different things that could happen. A relationship could be created between the women standing on the side of the road to the car that is driving past and questions asked such as do they know each other? Different social representations that we commonly associate with can come to play in a narrative photograph to help determine how we invent the story. For example in Crewdson’s image he shows a pregnant women alone on the side of the road. By making her pregnant enables her to become more vulnerable compared to the person in the car. In this photo there are aspects that everyone would agree on such as the mise-en-scene, the colour of the buildings and the mist in the sky. However what narrative photography aims to do allows you to come up with several different outcomes and storylines enabling you in a way to feel in control of the photo.
References:
Van-de-Velde, Zoe. ‘The Tableau Photograph as Visual Fiction’ (2011). [Accessed on: 16/03/2015.] Available From:
http://www.brighthub.com/multimedia/photography/articles/121147.aspx
Raham, Tania. ‘Narrative Theory’. Powerpoint Presentation. [Accessed on: 16/03/2015.] Available From: http://www.slideshare.net/cfgstania/todorovs-theory-7100632
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