This book is supposed to examine the history of war photography: how war photography developed, and how it influenced public attitudes towards wars anThis book is supposed to examine the history of war photography: how war photography developed, and how it influenced public attitudes towards wars and in turn, perhaps, influenced the way wars are fought.
This, it is not. It is merely a thumbnail history of war since the Crimea, with occasional reference to photography and photographers.
Good concept, in other words; disastrous execution. After finishing this book you are unlikely to know anything about the history of war photography that you couldn't have learned anywhere else: first, there were bulky, unwieldy cameras and slow processes; then came the Leica. Sometimes photographers had access; at other times, they did not.
Okay, then.
The book fails to identify and develop any major themes, such as controversies over access and over bias, or the difficulty of photos being taken out of context, or state censorship and self-censorship, or ethical dilemmas. Neither does the book examine in anything but the most superficial way the impact of technology on the nature of war photos, or the impact of those photos on our perception of war. All it does is to list a series of conflicts, as if the author ran into a deadline and couldn't make anything of his notes.
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