FALLING MEN
An opinion piece in today’s (September 14, 2014) Times, which describes (and endorses) the way one can fall in love with a work of art, is illustrated with this Garry Winogrand photograph of a man falling off a building. I was stunned by its uncanny resemblance to The Falling Man, the famous AP photograph of a man falling from the top of the World Trade Center on 9/11. Both images show the men in virtually the same position: upside down, facing the building, with arms flailing and legs bent.
Of course the context is dramatically different. Winogrand’s man is a performer, falling off of a low ledge, with three other men dressed as bellhops watching admiringly, and a bin of crushed paper to cushion his landing. The 9/11 falling man hovers high above the ground, but the striped skin of the Twin Towers behind him is instantly recognizable, and his fate is clear. Just days after marking another anniversary of the event, seeing Winogrand’s falling man, and reading the lighthearted piece accompanying it, which makes no reference to the other photograph, is chilling. Each time I look at Winogrand’s falling man I can only see the 9/11 falling man, who conjures violence and sadness.