A Picture is Worth 1,000 Words

Had enough of your baby's crying? Then how about looking at someone else's? I ran across this gallery on ABC.com. The photos are taken by Jill Greenberg in 2006, who got the idea of doing the shoot while she was photographing a little boy who couldn't stop crying. We've all seen our own babies cry (especially those of us who have colicky babies or babies with infant reflux), but when you freeze that face for one split second, it's amazing how tragic they look.

To make the children cry for the photo, Greenberg took away a piece of candy they were eating, or a toy that they were playing with. This process is called "manipulation" and many were critical of Greenberg for using it to benefit herself. She responded by saying that all the children were fine during the shoot, and only started crying when their parents told them to it was time to go home. Each mother was present, and never disagreed with what Greenberg was doing.

Wikipedia says, "Greenberg's End Times, a series of photographs featuring toddlers, was the subject of controversy in 2006. The work featured stylized hyper real closeups of children's faces contorted by various emotional distresses. The pieces were titled to reflect Greenberg's frustration with both the Bush administration and Christian Fundamentalism in the United States. The method for getting the children to cry, in some cases, achieved by offering the children candy, then taking it away, spurred allegations of unethical conduct and provoked the submission of numerous complaints to the art gallery that hosted a public showing of Greenberg's work."

Regardless of how one feels about it the process in creating it, you really can't argue that the end result is truly moving.

To see entire gallery, click here.

Note: This article's premise is derived from a story covered by abcnews.com and as such is covered under the fair use policy of copyright law: http://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/fair-use/what-is-fair-use/