Picturing Atrocity

Product Description

Ever since the landmark publication of Susan Sontags On Photography it has been impossible to look at photographs particularly those of violence & suffering without questioning our role as photographic voyeur. Are we desensitized by the proliferation of these images? Or do the images stir our own sense of justice & act as a call to arms? Are we consuming the suffering of others? What should our responses to these images be? To answer these questions Picturing Atrocity brings together essays from some of the foremost writers on photography today including Rebecca Solnit Alfredo Jaar Ariella Azoulay John Lucaites Robert Hariman & Susan Meiselas to offer close readings of images that reveal the realities behind the photographs the subjects & the photographers. From the massacre of the Sioux Indians at Wounded Knee to the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib from famine in China to apartheid in South Africa Picturing Atrocity examines a broad spectrum of photographs. Each essay focuses specifically on an iconic image offering a distinct approach & context in order to enable us to look again
- this time more closely
- at the picture. In addition four photo-essays showcase the work of photographers involved in the making of photographs of brutality as well as the artists own reflections on these images. Together these essays cover the historical & geographical range of atrocity photographs & respond to current concerns about such disturbing images. Picturing Atrocity is an important read not just for insights into photography but for its reflections on human injustice & suffering. In keeping with that aim all royalties from the book will be donated to Amnesty International.