Sick Woman

In this sorrow-filled photo, Hsu Yuan-fu blacked out the space surrounding the aged woman, giving her an even more pitiable appearance. The gnarled, bony hands, crossed and hanging in a shawl wrapped around her neck, and her seated posture, leg bent, toes in an uneven row, convey an even deeper impression of the hardships she has suffered. Nevertheless, her plain white garment and the towel wrapped neatly around her cheeks are full of vitality. The woman gazes slightly upward, an indication of the angle Hsu chose to shoot from; had he taken the picture at eye level, the wrinkles on the woman's forehead not would be as pronounced, which would have diminished the overall sense of helpless decrepitude. In addition to his deeply aesthetic, rigorously designed compositional skills, Hsu had a facility for capturing "stimulation points," elements that catch viewers' attention, triggering imaginative associations. Any and all techniques that could be used to enrich imagery, such as cropping to augment or reduce light, granularity, or other devices, were sharp tools in his kit.