Commons:Featured picture candidates/File:Circumcision central Asia2.jpg/2

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Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes.Voting period ends on 19 Feb 2020 at 00:40:55 (UTC)
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SHORT DESCRIPTION

Background this historic photograph was previously nominated in 2016 and closed without consensus because a question went unanswered. The lack of a clear response was a good faith misunderstanding: the nominator was not the editor who performed the restoration. I am the editor who performed this restoration; until yesterday I was unaware that this image had ever been nominated for FP at Commons. After a cordial conversation with the person who posed that question it seems worthwhile to nominate this again. Please excuse the new account; in the decade since retiring I've forgotten the old password.

The image is in use on dozens of Wikimedia projects and is featured on four language editions of Wikipedia. It provides encyclopedic background for a topic of universal interest which attracts high user traffic: an editor on the Italian language Wikipedia who maintains tables of highly trafficked articles notes the corresponding article as among the 20 most visited articles site-wide for three weeks in 2017 and 2018.[1][2][3]. Stating these things not to boast, rather as explanation why this particular image deserves a brief return from wiki-oblivion to respond to a well reasoned question in the absence of other answers.

The albumen print has good composition and superior technical merits for circa 1870, an era when long exposure times made informal group portraits quite difficult to do well. The image was made in central Asia in or near what is now Turkmenistan. The earlier FP nomination question had to do with whether the scanned print's deep sepia tones are the photographer's artistic intent. It's safe to say no. Albumen needs less exposure time than glass plate photography, which was a constraint in 1870 for a composition where any of eight subjects might move at any time. Afterward the print paper yellowed for nearly fourteen decades before it was scanned. My final edits corrected a subtle technical problem (probably a minor chemical imbalance) that caused yellow to be relatively dominant on the left side of the image and magenta to predominate toward the right, then a partial desaturation to reduce the intrusive coloration of antique paper, plus adjustments to correct for fade. This restoration strives to recreate the print's appearance in its early years: the albumen only slightly browned, dirt and creases removed, and repairing chemical damage to the sleeve of a man toward the right.

The earlier FP conversation is Commons:Featured_picture_candidates/Log/April_2016#File:Circumcision_central_Asia2.jpg,_not_featured and yesterday's more detailed conversation is User_talk:Ikan_Kekek#A_very_old_FP_conversation. Reference uploads are linked from the image hosting page for the unedited original and an intermediate edit. Many thanks to Ikan Kekek for insightful and supportive commentary. Durova 2 (talk) 00:40, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The length and width of the physical print, you mean? The Library of Congress image information gives the scan filesize but not the dimensions of the source image.[4] Followed up with other searches about size information about albumen prints. The border design on the mounting paper suggests that this print was a standard size, either a cabinet card.[5] (108 mm x 165 mm) or a carte de visite[6] (54 mm x 89 mm). Both formats were used during the era when this was made. If you want my best guess between those options I'd say cabinet card. A safer reply would be the print is small enough to stabilize with a thick paper backing; albumen print papers are lightweight.[7] Durova 2 (talk) 10:03, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Everything, really? Including rape and snuff? And while we should have materials on some disturbing topics, we certainly don't need to promote them. --The Cosmonaut (talk) 19:06, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • I assume you know the difference between a fictional depiction and reality, yes? Though if you say you'll support a photo from this category featuring human subjects, should it ever get nominated, I'll admit that you're at least being consistent. --The Cosmonaut (talk) 19:56, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • If the photo is of exceptional quality, had encyclopedic value and would be useful for articles in the project, I would consider the photo carefully, just like any other nomination. I did not say I would support just any photo just because it is horrible. In the long run, it would be desirable to have at least one FP in every category here on Commons, but we are a long way from that yet. --Cart (talk) 20:24, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you for the link to that other conversation. I see your point. Being inactive for ten years means being out of the loop on an active debates. Please weigh this consideration: the past isn't necessarily as finished we'd like to believe. Ansel Adams donated his photographs of Manzanar to the public domain hoping the public would learn from them. Now signs refusing service to all Chinese customers are starting to reappear in other countries' shop windows.[8] It's when people become complacent and think those things are done and over that segregation returns; all it takes is a few weeks of virus bring it back. Part of the reason for working with those images from internment camps and John Vachon's photographs of Jim Crow segregation is to bring these important topics closer so people do consider them carefully. Durova 2 (talk) 23:18, 10 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
  •  Comment - Billions of people are members of religions that practice circumcision. Refusing to feature photos of the practice smacks of anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish bias, though I understand the position that it's only against genital mutilation. But what makes a man Muslim or Jewish? Speaking as a Jew, not circumcising means denying the covenant and cutting yourself off from your people. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:39, 11 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Confirmed results:
Result: 9 support, 5 oppose, 0 neutral → not featured. /--Cart (talk) 10:27, 19 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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