The other night I watched the film ‘The Bang Bang Club’, this true story follows the lives of Kevin Carter, Greg Marinovich, Ken Oosterbroek, and Joao Silva, a group of photographers working in the South African Townships during Apartheid. More can be found out about them here. 

There is a scene in the film where Marinovich pleads with supporters of the ANC (African National Congress) for the life of a man believed to be a member of an opposing political party who is being brutally beaten. Paying no heed to the photographers pleas the man is set on fire, Marinovich continues to photograph the man. He exposes a frame as one of the ANC supporters brings down a machete on the burning mans head. The resulting photograph (See bellow) won Marinovich the Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography.

Following this Kevin Carter won the Pulitzer too, with a photo that would haunt him, that of a vulture stalking a starving child in the Sudan (See bellow). As the photograph gained notoriety people started asking questions about the fate of the child, questions that Carter couldn’t answer. It is thought the criticism that stemmed from this contributed to Carters subsequent suicide.

My photographic aspirations being Photojournalistic I couldn’t help but ask myself what I would do in similar situations. Is it right to intervene? Could I make a difference? Isn’t simply taking a photograph of that act, that situation, offering help in a far greater reaching and profound way? Showing the wider world what’s happening, is that enough?

I think that its very easy to sit as comfortably as we do in the western world and through a mix of moral schooling and ideals planted into us by action movies say that we would save the day and make a difference. After a few years living and traveling in south east Asia I can say that I’ve seen poverty, but then again who hasn’t? We are bombarded with imagery through charitable channels, that give us images of extreme poverty with our morning cornflakes and coffee. I think of it as poverty porn and we have become numbed by it. I think that its is time photographers found new ways of communicating the situation. From the image makers point of view this would be far better than the physical help that Kevin Carter was blamed for not giving, it’s a drop in the ocean. Please excuse me if in expressing this sentiment I sound callous.

While plowing through Susan Sontag ‘On Photography’ in the bath this morning I came across a quote which sparked this post:

 ‘The camera is a kind of passport that annihilates moral boundaries 
and social inhibitions, freeing the photographer from any responsibility toward the people photographed. The whole point of photographing people is that you are not intervening in their lives, only visiting them.’ Susan Sontag   

As I am young in my photographic career, I find it hard, both to agree or disagree with this statement. It does however seem to me that in photographing someone you do take on a certain responsibility, not least that it is well known the photographs lies, or can be made to lie with composition. You also take on responsibility in how you publish the image, it is your duty to present the person or situation as accurately as possible whether it is good or bad.

I took the above photo while in Thailand, I walked into a small fishing village early in the morning, the houses are corrugated iron and bamboo. I went over to a table of fishermen, sitting and smoking after putting their nets out. Despite not speaking the language we had a laugh and I took some photos. Me walking into that village and taking that photograph was motivated by nothing more (or less) than wanting to take some pretty pictures. I had no anticipation for it to help anything or change anything. While I agree its not as extreme as war or famine, but in this case I was acting exactly as the photographer that Sontag describes.

What comes of all this? Only more questions. However I will leave you with a quote from ‘The Bang Bang Club’:

KEVIN: Greg? They’re right you know?
GREG: Who?
KEVIN: All of them. All of the people that say its our job…. to sit there and watch people die. They’re right.
GREG: Thats not me.
KEVIN: Yes it is.
GREG: Its in your head Kev. Not mine.
KEVIN: I’m not alone.