It was just a passing comment, not a judgement. I’m familiar with historical dress and never made any comment about her dress or hairstyle. When I first read it, I assumed the description was for the first photo until the first photo was posted for a second time below.
A lot of these photos (the originals) can be found here: Mug shots | Sydney Living Museums
Are people not looking at the same boingboing post I’m looking at? None of the Khmer Rouge photos are posted on the Boingboing post I’m seeing.
I’m also not sure why people are reading other things into my comment that I haven’t written or extrapolating it to photos I haven’t seen. People are responding as though discussion of historical photos can’t involve looking at the people in them. People are responding as though someone looking older than their years can’t be at all related to the hard life she has probably lived. I’m also not sure why everyone else’s assumption that looking older than 25 must be a terrible judgement about a person is somehow on me. If you think being older than 25 is a bad thing, that’s your own lens on it, not mine.
Is everyone similarly livid about the multiple descriptions of Florence Owens Thompson looking “careworn” in the famous dustbowl photo of her? Surely that commentary must also be judgement on the woman who is the subject of the photo.
The Khmer Rouge photos were rightly linked and not embedded/displayed.
It’s been 15 years since I spent a day at Toul Sleng and it still haunts me.
Probably because it was unsolicited and extremely unnecessary?
Genocide victims - super bad taste.
Random 100 year old mug shots of people accused of petty crimes? Could be a commentary on the prolific superficial use of a smile which doesn’t always reflect what is going on inside.
Most likely not intended, but I think is a glorious irony of the habit of men telling women to smile more - and then going about physically painting a smile on old photos.
“Man Defaces Images Of Murdered Cambodians”
That any fucking clearer?
There are several iconic photos of a smiling, presumably happy Anne Frank in existence, and I don’t think anyone (who isn’t a monster) has any problem with those being used to remember who she was in life rather than just how she died. But if someone made the extremely misguided decision to add a smile to a Nazi-government-issued ID card photo of her (if one existed) I think it’s fair to assume that would receive a hell of a lot of condemnation for all the reasons that people are stating here.
The radical ambitions of the Khmer Rouge first required sweeping away the Khmer Republic government of US-backed nationalist Lon Nol, a politician and military leader who rose to power in a 1970 coup d’etat. But despite Leang’s apparent allegiance to the revolution, the schoolteacher would be executed at Tuol Sleng in 1976.
“At that time, he must have been 31,” Senyint said of his brother, five years his senior. Of the 18,145 prisoners brought to Tuol Sleng, only 12 survived.
Let’s amplify that horrific fact for ‘all the people in the cheap seats’ who seem to be missing the main point of this story, which is the loss of their humanity on top of the immense loss of human life:
Even louder for the hard-of-understanding, as that was just in one re-education camp;
2 MILLION PEOPLE murdered. And that’s only a low estimate as records were destroyed.
Perhaps Matt Loughrey is one of those people that feel the need to constantly tell people they’d be a lot prettier if they just smiled.
when do we see pictures of all of those killed in “the troubles” with their party clothes and smiling faces?
Surely he’s given the same treatment to his own…
Provocative art being provocative. I’m shocked!
I can’t see this topic going anywhere productive until/unless the artist decides to speak out. The replies that remain make the points clearly.
