I've always been fascinated with photoraphy, particularly photo-journalism, but I've never understood it. While I've been told I have an eye for composition, I certainly have never understood the relationship between a camera and colour. I've never grasped light and shaddow and how to take a photograph that exploits those two properties. I fact I often mailnly manage to take photos that are quite spoilt by one or other or sometimes both. I admire and envy those who have grasped these things and in an age of digital photography, those people seem to me in a particularly good place.
The Exhibition contains a selection of the best news photography based not on the topic celebre of today, but rather the technical brilliance, articulation and artistic integrity of the photograph. As a result there is an array of images from events and situations that are quite forgotten to the world's mainstream media. The drugs wars of Mexico, the abortion industry in Kenya, the Somalian prison system, the East Java Earthquake, the streets of Haiti all have sections of brutal, harrowing, and thought provoking images that require what seems like an age to digest. Three photographs from the Somali prison struck me right between the eyes, particularly the shot of a 25 square metre room housing 60 prisoners with only one bucket serving as a toilet and not a matress between them. Equally as powerful was the picture of three men sleeping out in the open Yemeni desert after crossing the Gulf of Aden from Somalia in a series about desperate migration. Sometimes images like those can take longer to consume than a 1,000 word article.
I think the unique personal perspective on events and situations that photography provides brings a completely impactful insight to current affairs that neither the written word nor the moving image ever can. For a start, the photographer says everything which thechoices he or she makes. Choice of the moment, choice of light, choice of subject and choice of mood. Also it seems such a more personal view than the written view or a piece of footage. An article is edited, massaged and cut based on all manner of nuances brought by the aggrogated agendae of editor, publisher, owner and advertiser. Footage is sliced and diced by so many producers and editors it can barely recognise itself from the raw material. They are both products of a machine while a photograph is one person's product, entirely contrived of one point of view. And yet, what they are able to provide is a voice for the subject too.
Searing photograhy also means that - depending on the power of the photograph - it can have an impact on the psyche quite inependent of the news agenda of the general media. Regardless of whatever political heartbeat is taking precedent at that moment, a powerful photograph can always punch through that noise with unequivical clarity and reset the perspective.
One shot, the shot of Bibi Aisha, quite deservedly took centre stage. Bibi Aisha ran away from her violent husband but was captured by Taliban-assisted relatives who took her into the mountains one night and, after slicing off her ears, literally cut her nose off to spite her face and left her to die. Miraculaously, a consortium of charitable organisations conspired to return her to a full recovery, both psychological and physical. Now she stands as a symbol of triumph over adversity as well of the brutality of a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. The photograph is so powerful and for me, has all the profound, evocative and graphic expression of The Mona lisa. It is all about her expression, her eyes, what she is saying to you through the camera and not about her horrendous injury and ordeal. She is remembering, accusing, injured and challenging all at once. What does she say to you?
P.S. For anyone remotely interested in photograhy, I strongly recommend The Guardian Eyewitness iPad app, which selects the most striking photograph of the day and downloads it in beautiful clarity.