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Afghanistan: Pictures Not Taken 'When the press started to feel empowered to show and tell the truth, it was only a matter of time before the military and government powers would retaliate.' By Travis Beard Journalist Ash Sweeting rides in a pickup with the Afghanistan National Police. Photo by ©Travis Beard/Argusphotography. Nothing has more power to communicate the destruction and despair of our time-especially from the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan-than photography. But in the sanitized and censored environments now of government and military control, taking the picture can be as difficult as getting it published. In coverage of these wars, freelance photojournalists are indispensible. One after another, news organizations have abandoned the task of informing the public. For editors back home, photojournalists-and the images they transmit-are problematic. But it's not the photographers who pose the problem; it's the truth their images tell. During the Vietnam War, there was the searing image of nine-year-old Kim Phouc running down the road with her flesh melting and fusing into her body after a napalm strike and her brother running in front of her with an expression that recalled Edvard Munch's "The Scream." This photograph spoke to people in ways that words had failed to do. These children were ones the Americans were supposed to be saving, not bombing. Images such as this one did much to turn the tide of that war, but if they did, it was because they conveyed important truths.

"Blood and Dust: Vaughan Smith on the rescue teams saving lives in Afghanistan"

War and Peace in Afghanistan Photographs by Louie Palu and audio clips recorded during his travels capture the violence and tranquility in everyday Afghan life.

Army photographer Corporal Jon Bevan spends ten days with the Royal Artillery and six months in Afghanistan.

"Here is a link to New York Times photographer Damon Winter's photo series, "A Grunt's Life", which won the third place award in the Pictures of the Year International "Feature Picture Story - Newspaper" contest. No one seems to be questioning the quality of Winter's work; rather, there was been a stir of debate regarding the series' lack of objectivity in capturing the "reality" of the War in Afghanistan. Does the old school, discolored, oversaturated, plastic toy camera feel of the photographs, which was created through the Hipstamatic app on Winter's iPhone, detract from their validity? "

Army photographer corporal Adrian Harlen talks about his expierenced in afghanistan

The photographer Simon Norfolk finds moments of beauty and wonder in the world's most forlorn landscapes. From Afghanistan to Auschwitz, Norfolk documents the imprints of war-sometimes physical, sometimes physic-on its surroundings. His book Bosnia: Bleed is an impressionistic testimony to the mass slaughter that accompanied the war in the former Yugoslavia. In particular, he focuses on the sites of "secondary mass graves," where the perpetrators tried to hide the evidence of their crimes. He writes, "They thought that, by intimidation and subterfuge, their dirty secrets could be preserved, held, trapped. Frozen."

As photographer Simon Norfolk claims in the following interview, his work documents an international "military sublime." His photos reveal half-collapsed buildings, destroyed cinemas, and unpopulated urban ruins in diagonal shafts of morning sunlight - from Iraq to Rwanda, Bosnia to Afghanistan - before venturing further afield into more distant, and surprising, landscapes of modern warfare. These include the sterile, climate-controlled rooms of military command centers, and the gargantuan supercomputers that design and simulate nuclear warheads.

Brighton Photo Biennial Memory of Fire: The War of Images and Images of War festival review and interview with curator Julian Stallabrass by Guy Lane The Brighton Photo Biennial offers an in-depth exploration of the photography of war. Ten exhibitions, in locations across the South Coast, examine various aspects of the production, use and circulation of imagery during wartime. At the heart of the Biennial is a comparison of photojournalism from the Vietnam and Iraq wars, featuring - amongst others - the work of Larry Burrows, Don McCullin, photographers from the North Vietnamese Army, Bilal Hussein and Stephanie Sinclair. Harriet Logan's photographs of women in Afghanistan are afforded a solo show; as is Philip Jones Griffiths' Agent Orange project. Dutch photojournalist Geert van Kesteren presents edits from his books, Why Mister Why? and Baghdad Calling. Themes of censorship and obscenity are addressed in an installation by Swiss artist Thomas Hirschhorn. The representation of war by contemporary art photographers - including Simon Norfolk, Paul Seawright and Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin - is the subject of a further exhibition. Julian Germain hosts a display of pictures made by military personnel based in Portsmouth. And separate shows of material from the First World War (by Frank Hurley), and the Mexican Revolution, suggest historical parallels to the more recent work. The Biennial, titled Memory of Fire: the War of Images and Images of War is described as an opportunity for visitors "to experience a range of imagery and to reflect critically on the different elements and contrasts." It runs from the beginning of October for six weeks. Below, curator Julian Stallabrass discusses some of the diverse issues and topics raised by the show.

Read the Report After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts, and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account. -Maj. General Antonio M. Taguba (USA-Ret.), preface to Broken Laws, Broken Lives In PHR's new report, Broken Laws, Broken Lives, we have for the first time medical evidence to confirm first-hand accounts of men who endured torture by US personnel in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo Bay. These men were never charged with any crime.

A New Website for a Changing World SocialDocumentary.net is a new website that features documentary photography from around the world-images and words that explore the human condition. Easily Create Documentary Websites About Critical Issues Facing Our World Today Professional and amateur photographers, journalists, NGOs, students-anyone with a story to tell and a collection of good photographs-can easily and affordably begin creating websites on SocialDocumentary.net. Global warming, international justice, post-conflict reconstruction, HIV/AIDS, or life in Afghanistan or suburban America are just a few of the themes that you can find on SocialDocumentary.net. The goal of this website is to make our lives richer and more informed about issues affecting us and our world today. Powerful photographs can also lead to meaningful change in the lives of ordinary people. SocialDocumentary. net provides tools for photographer to inform viewers how to take action-either by supporting NGOs doing work on the issues, or by engaging in direct political action. Not all documentary photographers are concerned with action. Many photographers featured on SocialDocumentary.net are concerned with subtleties of the human experience and exploring personal themes. Photographs on SocialDocumentary.net-whether of struggling farmers in Africa or of suburban teenagers in Philadelphia-offer a fresh way to look at the world and a greater understanding of humanity. The secondary goal is to create an online image bank of quality photographs documenting all aspects of the world created by an international collection of photographers. This will enable students, college professors, journalists, and anyone else to easily see any part of the world in quality digital imagery and gain valuable information about the subjects they are viewing. We encourage all photographers, everywhere, to use this site as a tool in their own image-making and documentary exploration. We also encourage n

NEW YORK-The panoramic photograph of a bootless soldier, sprawled almost gracefully in death in Afghanistan, might have made readers pause for a moment if it had appeared in a newspaper or magazine. But when "Taliban Soldier" filled a New York City gallery wall-blown up to near life size-it made the art world take note. Taken with a large-format camera, the monumental 4- by 8-foot print was presented for $15,000 four years ago at the Ricco Maresca Gallery, a Chelsea stop usually favored by folk and fine art collectors. It catapulted the Paris-based photographer Luc Delahaye, who shot the image on assignment for Newsweek, into international prominence. And it signaled a turning point for a small club of international war and "conflict" photojournalists, who now see their images appearing regularly in gallery and museum shows. Suddenly, the reality of war, famine, poverty and pain has turned into fine art. "Great collectors are always looking to be delighted by something that they don't know about, and this excites some of them," says Bill Hunt, the former Ricco Maresca co-director of photography who introduced Delahaye to gallery crowds.

good source of news on central asia and caucasus

Sharbat Gula - 'The Afghan Girl' photographed by Steve McCurry for National Geographic.

photojournalist

Michael Kamber of the NYT on Iraq, embedding and photojournalism in conflict zones