War Correspondence

I remember my Dad telling me stories from his youth about how his family was affected by the war. All house windows had to have heavy 'black out' curtains which had to be drawn at dusk and not opened during the evening. To do so was to invite an angry poiceman at your door. The reason of course being to deny enemy aircraft flying overhead any inkling that there was a town beneath them. There were also stories about being woken up in the middle of the night by the air raid siren and going to the shelters. I guess this had an effect on me at a young age as I later joined the Marines and stayed for 15yrs.  Photography had been my hobby for many years so it occured to me that I would be very well placed to take the path of war correspondent. At the time however, I had a young family of my own, and so it was not an option. I would probably not be writing this had I followed that career path.

It strikes me that there is however, a certain parallel with that of street photography/portraiture and that of war correspondent. The street could be seen as a sort of battle field, with people going about their lives, trying to cope under adverse circumstances. Under both circumstances the photographer is far removed from their immediate environment. The 'flow' of action, movement works better if the photographer is not involved, indeed how can they be involved, holding a camera instead of a rifle? This obviously does not mean they are not legitimate targets for enemy fire.  Both environments can prove very hostile places within which to work, which I found during a recent shoot in Chester. In both circumstances the photographer and the participants are best served if he/she is 'invisible'. The ability to blend into one's environment being a distinct advantage. Many war photographs show street scenes which, under any other circumstances would be normal streets, however these are bombed streets showing the suffering and hardship of the  circumstances. However, they do show people coping, 'getting on with it' despite the war.

Another parallel could be drawn from the aiming of the camera and pressing the button to that of aiming a rifle and pulling the trigger, and indeed it has been. Yet another parallel is that of the ethics behind the taking of a photograph in a street without the knowledge of the subject, to that of taking a photograph of someone maybe fighting for their lives in a war scenario.
I recently bought Don McCullin's book Shaped By War. (2010) London: Johnathon Cape. I can't help thinking that if, maybe under different situations, these are the sort of images I would have been producing.


Berger on McCullin

'McCullin serves as an eye we cannot shut. Yet what is it that they make us see?
They bring us up short. The most literal adjective that could be applied to them is arresting. We are seized by them. (I am aware that there are people who pass them over, but about them there is nothing to say). As we look at them, the moment of the other's suffering engulfs us. We are filled with either despair or indignation. Despair takes on some of the other's suffering to no purpose. Indignation demands action. We try to emerge from the moment of the photograph back into our lives. As we do so, the contrast is such that the resumption of our lives appears to be a hopelessly inadequate response to what we have just seen'. Berger cited in Wells, L (ed.) The Photography Reader. (2010). Oxon: Routledge.

I cannot explain the paragraph you have just read, you have to experience it as I have, so I will show you some examples of McCullin's work;