She is a form, too beautiful to be real, poised and almost posed: her own angles against the creases of the hard surfaces of the world she’s too much like. Seeing her is like seeing architecture. Notice the patterns on the [running!] shoes and on the begging bowl and how those abstractions are replayed in the scene. We know she is a begger because of her bowl and because the photographer tells us so. We know that she is a woman because of her dress, the clothing that renders her (and so many women) anonymous. She loses her identity in so many ways: to composition, to concealing clothes, to repugnance. If we are climbing the steps (to a cathedral) we will undoubtedly pass by, not seeing her for the bowl thrust forward; nor will we see the compositional planes she occupies so perfectly. It is the same when we see a photograph of disaster, the exquisite forms of the dead or the color of blood against the dirt of battle, the twisted face of death. In her case, the poverty we assume she bears is hidden in the folds of a garment and the planes of a photograph that wrench beauty out of despair. Does the woman feel this beauty? Does she know how she is displayed so perfectly against the world? Who knows. She is no one we will ever know except here. Through her we are shown the action of grace: she saves us in spite of ourselves.
By Ken Arnold, Copyright ©2007. Used with permission.
On View: Beggarwoman, Photograph, by