Jake Banks – Murder in Hell’s Kitchen (Weegee)

Jake Banks
L1 Photography, University of the West of England

Murder in Hell’s Kitchen is a photo that makes me think for a multitude of reasons. The first reason being that it is such a macabre image; it’s a man who has been shot in the face. Another question the photo makes me ask is, who is this man? If I didn’t know the title of the photo I would still be able to tell that he is a murder victim because of the gun that is on the floor facing towards him. The photo kind of desensitises me to the fact that the victim is dead because it’s shot in black and white; I know that it is blood on the man’s face, however, it just looks like a black mark because I cant see any of the red tones. I like how the photo fades to black in the background, engulfing the man’s body and it gives a sense of the unknown which is a good metaphor for death. On the flipside of that, there is quite a lot of detail and light in the foreground from Weegee’s perspective.