Emulation Photo Essay Research - William Eggleston

William Eggleston is considered to be the father of color photography. Although he originally studied and learned to work with black and white film, Eggleston is best known for his color photographs. His first major show was at the MOMA and he received scathing reviews for his benign and boring photographs. However, this aesthetic of the everyday life is exactly what Eggleston had purposefully shot and wanted to portray in his work. Despite the seemingly simple subject matter in his work there is great depth behind the meaning of his work which is furthered by his use of color. Eggleston takes ordinary life and photographs it in a way that places a new perspective on whatever the viewer sees, making even what we see everyday seem almost strange. Contrary to many photographers he also never takes more than one photograph of a certain subject, he finds that he gets too caught up in which image is better. Yet when he shoots it is very fluid and natural, he moves from subject to subject, maybe lingering a few minutes to get the shot but then pursuing his next subject. Eggleston so beautifully gives life and meaning to what we see as meaningless, his most famous photograph one of a light bulb on a ceiling. Yet these benign pictures hold intense meaning in their simplicity. As Eggleston once said that every single space that is taken up in photograph holds great importance and this hold true to his work as you can find great depth in analyzing any of his photographs.