This issue is about war photographers. A common notion often present among some is that war photography is about selling human suffering. However, we should bear in mind that without these brave men and women, we would probably still view war as an act glory and courage as portrayed in Tennyson’s “Charge of the Light Brigade”, rather than what it actually is. War is no place for glory or patriotism but a filthy place of barbarity, and without the war photographers we would still be fooled by the Tennysons and not lend an ear to the Sassoons and the Owens. Robert Capa (1913-1954) can be regarded as the father of war photography. Originally from Budapest, Hungary, Capa moved to Berlin as a freelance photographer. With the rise of Nazism, Capa being a Jew (originally born as Endre Friedmann), was forced to flee Germany for France. Capa’s first published photograph featured none other than Leon Trotsky speaking on the meaning of the Russian Revolution. Accompanied by his girlfriend and fellow war photographer Gerda Taro, Capa joined the Workers Party for Marxist Unification (POUM) and documented the Spanish Civil War. It is here that Capa took the most revered of war photographs, “The Falling Soldier”, the portrait of a POUM militiaman falling to enemy bullets. It is here in Spain, that Capa lost Gerda Taro to the same war. Following Spain, Capa continued to appear across frontlines documenting the savagery of humanity, in Hankow, in 1938, in Normandy, 1944, in the ruins of Stalingrad in 1947, and the Nakbah in Palestine in 1948. By this time Capa had moved to US and was taking up assignments with the LIFE magazine. Later in 1947, Capa along with Henri Cartier-Bresson, David Seymour, George Rodger and William Vandivert, formed the Magnum photos, undoubtedly the best conglomerate of photo journalists in the world. Capa’s gear consisted of a variety of brands from Rolliflex TLRs to Leica, Contax and even Nikon 35mms towards the end. In 1954, while covering the First Indochina War in Thai Binh, Vietnam, Capa stepped on a landmine and died in the very battlefields he had documented over the years. Some of Capa's works can be found here. Below we present a small selection of his works. Kishore Parekh (1930-1982) was one of India's foremost photo journalists though he was not always based in his native country. He served as an inspiration and role model for many younger photographers hoping to follow in his footsteps. Parekh started out in life studying for a degree in chemistry. The subject could not hold his interest, especially after he acquired a box camera in college. No sooner had he obtained his bachelors degree in chemistry than Parekh was off to Los Angeles to study photography. A masters degree in cine photography from the University of Southern California followed in 1961. But the highlight of Parekh's American experience was an award winning portfolio which was given an eight-page spread in Life magazine. The photographs, among his earliest work of quality, are marked by a spontaneity which was to abide with Parekh through his working life. A year later returning to India, he grappled with editors and colleagues to create a space and niche for his photos. It was unheard for a photo to run across eight columns on the front page. But Kishore won his battles, not because of any personal chemistry with the owners of Hindustan Times but because of reader response to his sensitive images. Introducing the idea of the picture story to India, he was deeply influenced by the work of Eugene Smith, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Margaret Bourke-White. He was hip and suave and yet a street fighter when needed. In the post-colonial 1960’s with India at war with neighbours China (1962) and Pakistan (1965) and with hunger and famine still dogging the nation – including the Bihar Famine of 1966 - Kishore proved his mettle. His photos of Indian and Chinese soldiers face to face on the Sikkim border came to symbolize the tension between the two countries. His photos of police rounding up Naxalites after the Naxalbari uprising in 1967 still evoke the foreboding of that infructuous revolt. He closely documented the political lives of India's politicians and leaders, photographing first Prime Minister Nehru till his death in 1964. It was reported that Kishore’s persistence once led to Nehru slapping him down. Early one morning, when he was photographing Nehru at prayer at the Gandhi Samadhi, the Prime Minister thought Kishore was too close and intruding in a private and solemn moment. An angry Nehru asked him what he was doing and ordered him to get out. Kishore stood his ground saying this is what people would want to see and that he was doing his job. The Hindustan Times carried the picture next day and Nehru's office called to request ten copies of that photograph. When Prime Minister Nehru died, Kishore's exhibition of images of him became a point of pilgrimage for the nation. His picture of field marshal Ayub Khan and prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri talking privately in Tashkent, the night before Shastri's death is another classic. But there is nothing to challenge Parekh's documentation of the 1971 war in Bangladesh. At the time, Parekh was working in Hong Kong for a group publishing a range of business and culture magazines. He was on the first plane back to India the moment the war broke out and, fighting all odds, virtually smuggled himself on to a helicopter bearing the first Indian generals to arrive in Dhaka to take the surrender of the Pakistan army. His photograph of the surrender has, like his Tashkent picture of six years earlier, become a classic. But it is only a small fragment of Parekh's Bangladesh tapestry. He spent little more than a week in the newly-born, war torn, ravaged nation. And while Bangladeshis began gradually to come to terms with their new status, Parekh and his armoury of Nikon cameras ranged over the scarred face of Dhaka, putting together a moving testament of human suffering and hope. The book that came out of this must rank as a pinnacle of news photography. He spent 24 days sleeping at work and not coming home - processing and printing. He lost 15 pounds. And when the book "Bangladesh- A Brutal Birth" was born, the Indian government, in spite of having hordes of cameramen shooting for them, requested 20,000 copies. Parekh's restless spirit, which took him in search of photographic adventure, could not ultimately be contained within the format of a newspaper. In 1968 he switched to magazine journalism in Hong Kong and in five years had acquired a global reputation. He swung purposefully into commercial and studio photography - and turned eventually to the task of putting together picture books. But the enormous amount of work that poured out of his Bombay studio and office didn't again match the sensitivity and artistry of his first love of recording news and human experiences. He died of a heart attack in 1982 on the shore of Hemkund, amongst the mountains on a photographic quest. The Himalaya book would have been his third if he had lived to complete it. More than anything else, Parekh will be remembered most of all for the pictures he took that touch the essence of the human condition. Some of Parekh's works can be found here. Below we present a small collection of his works. James Nachtwey (1948- ) is possibly the most well-known war photographer of today. Nachtwey graduated from Dartmouth College in Art History and Political Science. In 1976 he started work as a newspaper photographer in New Mexico, and in 1980, he moved to New York to begin a career as a freelance magazine photographer. His first foreign assignment was to cover civil strife in Northern Ireland in 1981 during the IRA hunger strike. Since then, Nachtwey has devoted himself to documenting wars, conflicts and critical social issues. He has worked on extensive photographic essays in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza, Israel, Indonesia, Thailand, India, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, the Philippines, South Korea, Somalia, Sudan, Rwanda, South Africa, Russia, Bosnia, Chechnya, Kosovo, Romania, Brazil and the United States. Nachtwey’s gear consisted of Nikon FM2 and F3P. Nachtwey’s gear consisted of Nikon FM2 and F3P. Nachtwey has been a contract photographer with Time Magazine since 1984. He was associated with Black Star from 1980 - 1985 and was a member of Magnum from 1986 until 2001. In 2001, he became one of the founding members of the photo agency, VII. He has had solo exhibitions at the International Center of Photography in New York, the Bibliotheque nationale de France in Paris, the Palazzo Esposizione in Rome, the Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego, Culturgest in Lisbon, El Circulo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, Fahey/Klein Gallery in Los Angeles, the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, the Canon Gallery and the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam, the Carolinum in Prague, and the Hasselblad Centre in Sweden, among others. Nachtwey has also featured in the documentary “War Photographer” directed by Christian Frei. This is how Nachtwey sums up his life and work, “I have been a witness, and these pictures are my testimony. The events I have recorded should not be forgotten and must not be repeated”. Some of Nachtwey's works can be found here. Below we present a small collection of his works.
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