Hatnim Lee, daughter to two owners of a D.C- area liquor store, recently released a photo gallery of customer portraits. In the 8 photos available on CNN, each is snapped from behind a thick acrylic safety glass, where transaction take place between The Lees and the customer. Lee describes each "transaction" as a having more than a monetary value, but an emotional, or mental transaction. Hatnim describes there being "a human connection" and that "it almost makes you more curious in a way". "It's almost like if you have a barrier up, it makes you almost want it more, want to know them more. ... I ask (customers) for something so much more than their money. I ask them to be vulnerable for me or to share a piece of them with me. If you're taking a person's portrait, it's asking a lot of somebody."
In a transaction than usually only involves money and product, it's really interesting to hear a perspective that buying liquor/ other items sold at the store are not only about buying and selling, but about the human element involved. It's not always about the actual purchase, but the exchange of ideas, lifestyle, accents, emotion, knowledge, and anything that makes us who we are. The cashier or employee is always assumed to be just a worker, or paid to be there; however, in Hatnim's collection, the
I synthesize this to the Colombian Exchange, where not only were there people intermingling, but cultural influence, objects and foods, and such. The people were distanced, like the Plexiglass in Lee's store, by a language, culture, and skin tone - ie. forced to view each other as a stranger behind a dividing factor.
source:
http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/29/us/cnnphotos-plexiglass-liquor-store-portraits/index.html
The liquor situation is an odd way to think about promoting a human connection, but it does give a different perspective on the way ideas can be exchanged and shared.
ReplyDeleteJasmine Rodriguez Period 4