Soft White Underbelly Or Hardcore Poverty Porn?

Photo by Mark Laita of Rebecca, a trans woman and meth addict.

By Aria Novosedlik

It’s very tricky to walk the line between being part of the problem and part of the solution. Yet, in the world of advertising, design, and art, it happens all the time. 

Then there’s the line between viewer and voyeur. Take photographer Mark Laita. Laita has snapped iconic campaign photos for everyone from Apple (the brand’s highest paid photographer ever), to Smirnoff to Dior. He freely admits that he was ‘basically making wealthy corporations become even wealthier’. In 2016, as social media – specifically YouTube and TikTok – became primary sources of content consumption, Laita decided to resurrect a project he had started in 2008 as still photography but morphed it into a video series. With his studio just a stone’s throw from LA’s notorious Skid Row, he began plucking folks from the street in order to interview them on camera. Prostitutes, drug addicts, mentally ill people are all welcome in his studio. He offers small amounts of money and if he really likes them, he may try to help them out with a hotel room for a couple nights.

Photographer Mark Laita

Laita’s studio is typical: flowing charcoal backdrop, meticulous lighting, cameras set up with care – you could picture him shooting Lady Gaga or Nicole Kidman on this kind of set. But they would never allow anyone to shoot them without makeup and wardrobe. Laita’s approach is the opposite. His subjects are fresh off the street and desperately in need of care. 

Frames from one of several Soft White Underbelly video interviews with Rebecca 

One of his favourite subjects is Rebecca, a trans woman with a devastating meth addiction. You almost feel shameful watching the hour-long (!) interviews Laita conducts with her as she struggles with the disease of addiction. Laita doesn’t appear to ask Rebecca if she’d like to wash her face or offer her some clothes that aren’t covered in dirt. Yes, he’s documenting her as she is. But portraits are often meant to be a visual manifestation of someone’s essence. Sometimes, they represent what someone has the potential to become, not just what they appear to be. This isn’t about showing a subject in a charitable light – it’s about showing them in a dignified way. 

Toronto-based photographer Ed Gajdel, who built his career on celebrity photography, found a way to do that when he was asked to shoot portraits of some of the residents of 6 St Joseph House, once a Toronto hospice for people recovering from addiction. Gajdel brought the same care and respect for his subjects as he did to his portraits of people like Oscar Peterson, Leonard Cohen or Nelly Furtado. Bathed in a hopeful light and exuding positive energy, they definitely convey ‘what his subjects have the potential to become’.

Photo: Ed Gajdel, from ‘Healing Homelessness’, 2008

Photographers like Dorothy Lange, Diane Arbus and Josef Koudelka all gave their subjects the space to express their true essence. Because Laita’s medium is video as opposed to still photography, his subjects are automatically seen in a far more vulnerable light. This would be true for any subject, but it’s especially true for those under the influence. In the case of Rebecca, she’s never once been remotely sober on camera. This raises some serious ethical questions about consent. Most people would be pretty angry if their sober friend took photos of them while drunk and posted them online. 

Photo: Dorothea Lange, ‘Migrant Mother’, 1936

Dorothea Lange took one of history’s most well-known photos: ‘Migrant Mother’, 1936. It depicts a pensive but weary woman looking out beyond the lens. She’s strong despite her struggle. She ended up having eleven kids and they detested this photo of her up until her death because they felt that it painted her as the most destitute woman alive. Upon her death, dozens of letters were sent to her children expressing sympathy and explaining that the photo of their mother inspired them to donate to funds for medical care and several other causes. Upon hearing this, the children of ‘Migrant Mother’ realized that the documentation of their struggles had had a net positive impact on the world and forgave Lange for taking the photograph.

Photo: Diane Arbus. Untitled, 1970-71

In the 50s and 60s, Diane Arbus photographed what most would consider to be social outcasts. She was often hesitant to have her work displayed, but her insatiable desire to continue documenting what the ‘real’ world was like fuelled the continuation of her catalogue. This hesitation, however, speaks to her moral code and concern for exploitation: she didn’t want to profit from her art. She’d come from a very wealthy family in New York and was aware that her upbringing privileged her. While it was exciting to explore the fringes, she didn’t want to create a pictorial circus. But that proved unavoidable. In her 1977 book On Photography, Susan Sontag forcefully argues that despite her intentions, Arbus did in fact end up achieving what she claimed she was trying to avoid.

Photo: Josef Koudelka, from ‘Gypsies’, early 1960s

Czech photographer Koudelka was similar in his documentation of human struggle. Based in Communist-era Prague, he often lived on milk and bread in order to save money to purchase film for his artistic endeavours. He famously chose to photograph the struggles that various Roma communities (who were referred to as ‘gypsies’ at the time) experienced in Slovakia, Hungary and Romania during the early 1960s. Koudelka built personal relationships with his subjects, allowing him to shoot with candour and authenticity some of the most disarming and intimate moments of their nomadic lives. 

Lange, Arbus, and Koudelka all viewed themselves as documentarians. None of them were particularly interested in notoriety. By subtly dignifying their subjects by contextualizing them, the viewer feels less voyeuristic. For instance, while it’s clear that the subjects in Koudelka’s Gypsy series are living in dire poverty, Koudelka still captures moments of joy, despair and even pride. 

At the end of the day, Laita and Arbus have much in common. They both come from a privileged position: Arbus from a wealthy family, and Laita as a globally successful commercial photographer. They both look to the fringes of society for their subjects. Soft White Underbelly feels more like a pet project that just happened to become lucrative, rather than a plan to lift people up. Hearing Laita repeatedly say that his channel ‘isn’t a help channel’ and stating that the people he deals with are largely unfixable seems insensitive at best. He mentions numerous times that pretty young females addicted to heroin get him the most hits and are requested constantly, which he obliges. Oddly, he doesn’t find that disgusting. 

There’s no doubt that Laita believes he’s well-intentioned. But having virtually no faith that any of your subjects will be able to return to a normal existence, yet still deciding to shoot them begs the question: what’s the purpose here? Shooting them in compromising positions that will live for eternity online strips subjects of their essence, their dignity, and their hope. Internet humiliation never disappears. 

Aria Novosedlik is a Toronto-based designer, writer and researcher