The Arts in New York City

Something about photography never really sunk in until after my afternoon at the International Center of Photography, where I observed the archives of Robert Capa’s work, “This Is War!” The photographer is truly at work. Where the photographer stands is oftentimes the reason for great images. Even though the subject of a photo is the subject of the talk about a photo, one has to give credit to the boldness of the photographer. Because Capa takes shots of war from all angles, before, during, and after, it makes one wonder how slick he is, but you can most certainly feel like you are there with him. His perspective revolves around every aspect of war, the civilians, the refugees, the soldiers at war, the soldiers in between war, the soldiers approaching their battle, and the aftermath of the war.
Unlike the invaluable experience with sculpture at MOMA, I was dealing with gelatin silver black-and-white photography at the ICP. Martin Puryear’s sculptures were eye-candy, but nothing in Capa’s exhibition jumped out to catch my attention unless I examined each photo in the exhibit. It required more patience on my part, which is rather ironic, knowing that abstract art would seemingly be the one realm of art that would require patience. The more I explore the arts, the more I come to realize that you have to give yourself a chance to give the artist a chance.
At the exhibition, one will notice that there are many snapshots of the same scene taken at different points. For example, a section devoted to D-Day features a series of images of the struggling American soldiers landing on Omaha Beach in Normandy, France. Capa creates a theme of sequence that I found remarkable, because he does not give me the chance to stop for one moment to take a breath and soak in one photo. I have to look at all of it to see the continuous struggle these soldiers endure. What is truly mind-boggling, though, is that he managed to take the shots from the water, rough waters, not from the shoreline. His risk-taking nature is most certainly noted here. As I found out later, immediately after he took these shots, he boarded a returning ship that was hit and sank, but he made it back on another vessel. This was a wow moment for me.
Because of such risk-taking, I expected to find photos that were almost unreal to believe. One image that I found to be almost iconic was titled, “Marineros, [Rio-Segre, Aragon Front, near Fraga, Spain, Nov. 11, 1938]”. It was a black-and-white blur that suggested confusion in the chaos of war. A soldier is seen walking, rather clumsily, but to where, I did not know, possibly to face even greater danger. If he knew where he was going was a question. Wherever he was going, Capa depicted a soldier’s boldness in moving forward even when, for a lack of better words, “the going get’s tough”. We have no idea what the chaos of a war is like, but Capa captures the core of the moment in its most vivid form.
Although each war may have its differences, one idea surfaced in every corner of the exhibition. Wars do not limit the amount of human suffering and innocent lives lost. The most striking and heart-breaking photo was the “Child killed while trying to save his chicken and piglet during the Battle of Tai’erzhuang, [Xuzhou front, China, April 1938]”. A child lies on his face in the ground with the two animals that he was chasing also dead beside him. Beside the photo was an article from Life magazine, which revealed that the child was shot down by the machine gun bullets of the Japanese during the invasion on China. The child is isolated in the photo, lying without life, abandoned by his parents, who perhaps fled for their lives or died as well. The abandonment of the child perhaps triggered my greatest sympathy. Whatever the war, it is clear that the unnecessary loss of the civilian victims depicts the quality of war that we most dread, the cruel defacing of humanity. Also, in the Battle of Rio Segre section, was the photo of a “Refugee, whose husband and son were killed earlier in the war, waiting with her dog as she flees upward. [Barcelona Spain, November 11, 1939]”. Similar to the child, the lady in this photo also suffers from abandonment. Without a male figure to protect her, she is helpless, vulnerable, concerned for her safety, and uncertain about the direction she is heading. Drawing focus around what happens outside of the battlefield, Capa universalizes war—it dehumanizes without bound.
Robert Capa is the epitome of photographers who dare to take shots at the heat of the moment. In Capa’s case, it is war at its worst. The passion in each of his photos is evident from the Sino-Japanese War to World War II.