The Dead Sea Scrolls of Photography

April 30, 2009 by pmelcher.

No..it doesn’t have the swine flu virus. But it does contain some photojournalism archeological evidence. Surely, photojournalism archeology is a brand new science that does not date back as far as human archeology, but it is just as fascinating.

The famous suitcase believed to contain Robert Capa negative of the Spanish Civil war, found in Mexico, finally reveals some of it content. The first surprise: its not just Capa in there, but also “Chim” (David Seymour, co founder of Magnum) and Gerda Taro. The New York Times calls it “groundbreaking work”. I call interesting but certainly not groundbreaking. And a little frustrating. Mostly because the images shown do not seem at the level of already known work of these photographers. Poor edit ( its the ICP who is in charge, after all) or is this suitcase made of non choice? Hard to tell.

The suitcase does not reveal anymore information on the famous Mexican soldier image by Capa. Whether the curators destroyed it or are hiding the evidence or nothing was there, that is up to you to decide based on your level of Paranoia.

There is no pre history of photography. Thus, these images fit right in with contemporary stories, whether it is Georgia, Sri Lanka, Israel and too many other places of neighbors killing  neighbors. The faces of the victims or perpetrator are  similar to those we have seen photographed by the likes of Capa’s legacy.

click image to see the NYT slide show:

PS: How come Magnum doesn’t have these images. After all, 2 of the photographers are Magnum founders. Is it because Cornell, Robert’s brother, founded the ICP ? But still, how does that take precedent? Well at least its not one of the G’s ( Getty or Google_)

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