Marc Riboud. Washington DC. 1967. An American young girl, Jan Rose KASMIR, confronts the American National Guard outside the Pentagon during the 1967 anti-Vietnam march. This march helped to turn public opinion against the US war in Vietnam. Image from magnumphotos.com
A crisis in photojournalism has arisen in the last few years. Esteemed photojournalists have come forward to suggest that their life’s work is worthless, implying that imagery around war and misery serve no purpose in a world so conditioned by violence. Concerns around digital manipulation and biased reportage coupled with the lack of confidence in global media outlets have weakened the reputation of the once respected area of the press, with image overload due to camera accessibility also contributing to the problem. The photo reporters are defeated by the idea that wars will continue regardless of their efforts to bring about awareness.
This idea however, is a cynical one. “Photography cannot change the world,” French photographer Marc Riboud once said, “but it can show the world, especially when it changes”. Although documentation of tragedies can never undo the acts that lead to the occurrence, there is a definite importance in bringing issues to the fore and creating a discussion around them. This is true of Riboud’s iconic image of Jan Rose Kasmir, a demonstrator during the 1967 anti-Vietnam war march at the Pentagon. The photograph, which shows the young girl holding a flower to the National Guards guns, has become one of the most iconic shots in all the reportage of the Vietnam War, and has preserved Kasmir as a symbol of peace and love in the hippy-era of mass protest.
Gordon Parks. Untitled, New York, 1963. Image from parisphoto.com
Although the Vietnam War may have been one of the most heavily documented, it certainly wasn’t the first war and Kasmir definitely wasn’t the first ordinary person to be photographed fighting for freedom. Maybe she had been inspired by Gordon Parks’ images of civil rights protesters plastered all over Life Magazine a few years prior, or perhaps she’d felt motivated by Leonard Freed’s documentation of the March on Washington. It is possible that female demonstrators since the Vietnam War have felt compelled to protest for abortion rights and equality of the sexes based on the image of the young girl at the Pentagon, and the photographs chronicling the recent outcry against the angry orange leader of the free world is definitely reminiscent of protests past.
While journalism of course has its downfalls in terms of intended or unintentional manipulation, the great influence photojournalism will always hold is that of empathy. Rarely can text based reportage capture the same feeling than that of photojournalism, because oftentimes scenes are too emotional to write down. As the old saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words; a photograph can communicate very real scenes to its onlookers, invoking feelings of shock, outrage compassion and encouragement, inspiring its audience to go out, get together and stand up against the status-quo.
View below a selection of some of history’s most significant moments.
Guy Le Querrec. Paris. Women’s march organised by MLF (feminist movement) for the abortion right. 1979. Image from magnumphotos.com
Jeff Widener. Tank Man. Image from 100photos.time.com
Josef Koudelka. Invasion by Warsaw Pact troops near the Radio headquarters. Prague, Czech Republic. August 1968. Image from magnumphotos.com
Peter Marlow. London. Race Riots in Lewisham. Police making an arrest. 1977. Image from magnumphotos.com
Bruno Barbey. Londonderry. 1971. Street fighting against British soldiers. Image from magnumphotos.com
Larry Towell. Ramallah, West Bank. 2001. Protester with gas mask in cloud of tear gas. Image from magnumphotos.com
Jerome Sessini. Kiev. An Orthodox priest blesses the protesters on a barricade. February 20, 2014. Image from magnumphotos.com
Leonard Freed. Washington, D.C. August 28, 1963. The March on Washington. Image from magnumphotos.com
Martine Franck. Italy. Venice. 1972. Pro-Communist demonstration. Image from magnumphotos.com
A Abbas. Jerusalem. 1995. Right wing Israelis demonstrate after the Beit Lid suicide bombing, claimed by the Islamic Jihad, which killed 21 soldiers and one civilian. Image from magnumphotos.com
Raymond Depardon. West Berlin. Between the Brandenburg Gate and Potsdamer Platz. November 11th, 1989. A young man sits on the wall between East and West Berlin. Image from magnumphotos.com
Bruce Davidson. Alabama. Birmingham. 1963. Arrest of a demonstrator. “Damn the Defiant!” Image from magnumphotos.com
Eve Arnold. Abortion rights protest, London 1976. ‘Every child a wanted child.’ Image from magnumphotos.com