Italian Mother and Child, Ellis Island, New York.

Lewis Hine was a writer, social reformer, and photographer. While teaching at New York’s Ethical Cultural School in 1905, Hine took his students to Ellis Island to photograph incoming immigrants. In this photograph, Hine carefully positioned his subjects, bringing to mind altarpieces featuring the Madonna and Christ child surrounded by angels. In Hine’s work, a modern reality and a religious story are condensed into a single photographic frame. Hine said of his photography, “I wanted to show the things that had to be corrected. I wanted to show the things that had to be appreciated.”