Mechanical Reproduction

"Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be. This unique existence of the work of art determined the history to which it was subject throughout the time of its existence (p.220)."

 

Dorothea Lange, Japanese Americans line up at Tanforan  Assembly Center, San Bruno, California, 1942

Pictures like this hold such much meaning.  They truly posses the aura that Walter Benjamin talked about.  It shows a true time and place in history.