Life through a lense # 1

This is the first of a regular post on some of my favourite photographs. Some with accompanying reasons and some, well, I will just let the image do the talking.

I start with

Evelyn McHale by Robert Wile May 1947

On May Day 1947, just after leaving her fiancé, 23-year-old Evelyn McHale wrote a suicide note. 'He is much better off without me ... I wouldn't make a good wife for anybody,' ... Then she crossed it out. Got in the elevator of the Empire State Building and arrived at the observation platform. It was misty that day in New York, and as she looked out over the bustling metropolis 86 floors below, she gathered herself and jumped. At the point of impact she hit a United Nations limousine parked at the curb. The roof became her death bed. Across the street photography student Robert Wiles heard the loud crash of impact. A short four minutes after Evelyn McHale's death Wiles took this picture of death. The calm serenity, the tragedy of a lost life, the strange feeling of composure.

The camera telling a tale in all it's harrowing intensity yet beautiful with it. Appearing in Life magazine this intimate picture of a stranger made Wiles' name.