A Word a Week Challenge: Context

THE SAYING “A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS” is never more true than with a photograph. Photographs have tremendous power to communicate information. But they also have tremendous power to communicate misinformation, especially if we’re not careful how we read them.

    • Who or what do you see?
    • When was this photograph taken — what is happening in the photograph?
    • Where was this photograph taken?

and finally

    • Why?

context

So how do YOU interpret the context in this photograph? I’d love to hear what you think.

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Heyjude

I have lived in the UK for most of my life, but when young I definitely had wanderlust and even ended up living in South Africa for several years which was a wonderful experience. I now look forward to a long and leisurely retirement doing what I like most - gardening, photography, walking and travelling.

31 thoughts on “A Word a Week Challenge: Context”

    1. Well Cathy I think you win the prize! Prize? Well you would if there was one 😀
      She is a Parisian Mom, and had just collected her daughter from nursery – difficult to work out the time as there are no shadows. I was taken by the fact that even small children look so elegantly dressed in Paris!
      I am impressed by your observational skills 🙂

      1. Darn, Jude, too bad there’s no prize! I’m at least glad to know I WOULD have won had there been one! 🙂

        Parisians are always so elegantly dressed, that’s for sure. I loved watching them both times I was there. 🙂

  2. I think Europe too; working mum taking little girl to nursery school on her way in to the office?
    Good idea Jude.
    Regards as always, Pete. x

    1. Yep. Definitely Europe – what gives it away I wonder. Why not London? A Parisian mother collecting her daughter from nursery school. I thought they both looked so elegant!

      1. It is many things Jude, and they all scream ‘not UK’. The bike, the bollards, the guy in a suit with the rucksack, the style of the smart clothes on the woman. It just feels immediately European.
        Regards as always, Pete. x

  3. I think the woman is marching the little girl (who looks to be resisting) to a meeting with the bald guy with the backpack. He’s the child’s estranged father and the woman has had enough of being a mother – she wants her life back and is aiming to off load her daughter on her ex partner. He doesn’t know what’s about to hit him but the little girl plainly has an inkling.

  4. Excellent idea. Limiting the view does ask questions about what is happening to the little girl. Then opening up reveals that there is nothing to worry about. The context changes when the view changes.

    1. Thanks Imagineer, it does rather look as though the child is being dragged along by her mother. Quite a strange handhold. But yes, nothing wrong – just rushing home after work / nursery 🙂

  5. I think Mum is late for work and is rushing to the kindergarten to drop her daughter off, she has the girls lunch in the pink bag and is also loaded down with her bag for work…Good idea Jude, makes me really study the photo

    1. Glad you liked it PP. I just thought that a challenge about context ought to make you think about the context of an image, not just simply like / dislike it. You are pretty close – mother had just collected her daughter from nursery. It was a dull day (Paris) and so no shadows to help with the time and I guess they were rushing home. I was fascinated by how beautifully dressed the child is.

    2. Paris is right! Ding Ding! You and Cathy are very clever. What is it that screams Paris? The beautifully dressed child, the elegant mother in THOSE heels?

    3. Sigh… why I can’t English women look as elegant. Not to mention the children. Although I have never worn heels that thin, or high! And never will now.

        1. I’m afraid after the platform shoes (thick heels) I went all hippy and spent years barefoot or in clogs or sandals. Result, my feet spread and do not like being in anything remotely fashionable, though I did go through a phase in the 90s with various coloured court shoes.

        2. my crime, Charles Jordan court shoes in the 80’s – every day. Had them in all colour ways and now have the gift of calcium growth where my big toe met the shoe – ouchy.

        1. Oh, I was hoping you wouldn’t have read the other comments 🙂

          She is a very chic Parisian lady, and I am impressed that other people picked that up! Thanks for joining in Joseph.

    1. Almost correct! A Parisian mother (note the elegant trouser suit) having collected her daughter from nursery – I am guessing in a hurry to get home. It was the way the little girl was dressed that caught my attention. So unlike English tots.

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