Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/11/26

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Subject: [Leica] Conflict Photos
From: geordiepete211 at yahoo.co.uk (Peter Cheyne)
Date: Sun, 27 Nov 2011 13:31:19 +0900

HI Tina,

I didn't find the photos very manipulative, or contrived, apart from  
the fact that he was emphasizing the obvious:  photographer actually  
have physical bodies, they have a perspective, and some of them even  
pray.  I imagine the same is true of my green grocer and my prime  
minister.

The photographers did not co-ordinate the pre-riot scene.  The  
Palestinian youths were setting up a road block.  If you want to set  
up a road block, it makes sense to do it before the riot police.  And  
as for photos of flag burning and posing with rocks, I suppose most  
people know that the camera is right there at the point of view in the  
middle of which all lines of perspective converge to a vanishing point.

I thought this little boy's talk was quite insulting, especially when  
he thought he was making some clever point by showing photographers  
praying.  The fact that some people who pray are rioters, some are  
greengrocers, some are photographers, some are rabbis, has nothing to  
do with the issue.  The documentary maker was implying this was a  
religious conflict and that religious, human photographers would bias  
the perspectives.  It's not a religious conflict.  It's about  
occupation or territorial claim, depending on which side is looked from.

A photographer chooses an angle that includes a dramatic sky, and this  
documentary maker thinks he is doing cultural anthropology by pointing  
that out.  I'm sure none of us here on LUG choose the least  
interesting point of view before we press the shutter button.

I wonder what Tim Hetherington would have to say about this documentary.

All the best,

Peter