Would you like that Supersized with or without text?

When intentional changes to an original image present a different interpretation for the writer’s purpose, the image is open to a variety of possible meanings. During lectures, we are presented the opportunity to view and interpret images in our textbook that are purposely resized to fit the page with the associated text. When the image is presented on a screen, it is larger, more details become apparent, and then, there is a realization we missed the illustrator’s point of view because of the smaller version presented in the textbook—somehow, in a twisted way, the audience was robbed of the opportunity to view the image as it was presented originally. The explanation in the textbook helps with the interpretation but the appreciation for the details in the image is lost—we can’t see them but we are relying on the writer’s credibility!    

Let us look at Figure 1 where resizing an image could lead to an interpretation when compared to the illustrator’s original explanation. The view of this image could provide an interpretation of the Virgin Mary holding baby Jesus wrapped in swaddling cloths.

Figure 1.

When viewing the (approximate) original size in Figure 2, then it could be a poor starving woman who is begging for money to buy food for her child and herself. The image could tell a story but it tells without the clarity provided by words. 

Figure 2.



James Mahoney, an illustrator for the Illustrated London News, provided the accurate explanation for this picture in 1847 during the potato famine in Ireland:

The horrors of the poverty became visible, in the vast number of famished poor, who flocked around the coach to beg alms: amongst them was a woman carrying in her arms the corpse of a fine child, making the most distressing appeal to the passengers for aid to enable her to purchase a coffin and bury her dear little baby (Mahoney par 3).

The opportunity to view the original image with the associated text, allows the audience to view it with a sense of reality for emphasis and clarity. Is it ethical to intentionally use and change an image and take it out of context to serve another purpose, for example, to gain a profit?   

Source for cited work and image:

Mahoney, James. “Sketches in the West of Ireland.” The Illustrated London News. 12 Feb. 1847. Vassar College 30 Jan. 2008 <http://adminstaff.vassar.edu/sttaylor/FAMINE/ILN/West/West.html>.