Take A Picture, Tell A Story

I’ve always loved the interplay between words and photos. Together they can be more than the sum of their parts.

In a sense I’ve been working on “Take A Picture, Tell A Story” my whole career. During the summer of 1974, I went to Appalachia on my first photo project, spending three months documenting the coal miners’ strike in Harlan County, Kentucky. Along with a meagre amount of photo gear, I took a tape recorder and mic.

In 1996, two years into “Lost Promise: the Criminal Justice System,” I recorded stories for the text for the project. Since then I have done extensive audio recording for projects on emergency health care and the Pacific Exchange.

“Take a Picture, Tell A Story” is a continuation of “Lost Promise.” While working on a short project documenting the closing of San Francisco County Jail 3, then the state’s oldest county jail, a simple idea and phrase kept nagging at me. The phrase, “I take your photo, you tell me a story” sums up the idea. It was 2006 and San Francisco Sheriff Hennessey said yes.

Now this ongoing project has a name and a place to be seen and heard. – Robert Gumpert

Ben Smith 31/01/2017 Ben Smith 31/01/2017

Eddie Tate, 10 November 2011

21 Feb 2016: San Francisco, CA. Eddie Tate in his box at Harrisson and Division playing a video game. On 19 December 2016 Eddie Tate was shot to death at 16th and Shotwell in San Francisco. He was 51 years old and had been out of jail for at least four years.