The crisis of this hour

Most boys want to play with cars and guns.  If denied they will make their own.  Swords and the need to fight seem to be hard wired.  But the story behind this picture takes it a step further.  He had been asking his Mum for a land to air missile launcher, like the ones he had seen back home, and now at night he snuggles up next to it.  

I was on assignment in Lebanon during 2014.  My aim was to tell some of the stories behind the Syrian refugee crisis.  Lebanon had been the perfect choice for them, once a part of Syria the refugees could work without a permit.  But life is a daily struggle to survive.  Those out of the camps were renting one room in an unfinished apartment building for $200 a week.  Eight people in one room.  And three things, fear, trauma and the constant struggle to survive, had impacted everyone I met. 

Most adults would not show their faces because their one dream had been to return home, the fact that they had spoken to a journalist would put their life at risk.  They were not concerned for their children, they would change as they grew and no one would blame a child for having their photo taken. 

But for many thousands the hope of a peaceful return has changed in recent months.  The country is in ruins, drought has already disrupted agriculture and the only future seems to be a new start in another country.  Eleven million Syrian refugees and right now thousands are trying to escape.  The world needs to wake up.  I do not want to predict the future on the world’s stage, but this is the crisis of the hour.           

My first wired photo

The first time I wired a photo was while on assignment in Bosnia shortly after the war in 1998.  Working with my great friend and colleague Hazel Southam we were sending our story back to the Independent, a British national newspaper and paper of the year for photography.   Getting my photo back was a big deal.  It was a simple story with a serious undertone.  Landmines go on killing for years, long after conflicts have ended.  The rules may attempt to govern the use of landmines but the number of victims still keeps growing each year.  In Vietnam children lose limbs and their lives.  And in Bosnia the entire land was deemed a minefield.  If your vehicle left the road you were to wait for rescue, a narrow pathway would have to be secured after hours of work by trained professionals checking for mines.  Cluster mines were dropped by parachute, chrome balls that kids would love to pick up.  And anti-tank mines were set to explode under a bridge or in buildings where whole communities were gathered to die.  I remember a pile of rubble that was once a church, now it had a cross left on top as a memorial. 

Our story told of British soldiers teaching kids landmine awareness.  We had been on patrol where they were gaining the trust of the locals, who were largely controlled by mafia.  We had watched soldiers training to clear minefields, and a vehicle waiting for rescue after it had precariously left the road.  We had watched soldiers play with the kids.  We had driven for miles through wide planes where shot out tanks were left to rot, where villages lay waste, like Lord of the Rings where evil hoards had taken everything in their tracks.  And villages where no one was left alive – after genocide nothing seems to live, the land seems haunted not just with the dead but with hate and fear and darkness.  Silence broken by a crow, smoke rising from a few of the remaining buildings.  Many were tortured before they died – limbs and hands removed, eyes removed – medieval.  Soldiers driven near crazy after removing remains from a drainage system, piece by piece. 

As a journalist you get to hear people talk.  One soldier spoke of letting rip after getting home.  It should not be a surprise.  We expect our soldiers to release the most primal instinct to kill or be killed and then equally expect them to get things back under control.  Ignorant words spoken against the conflict, where this particular soldier had risked everything, were the trigger to release the rage and pain he held within.  He did not kill this man, but he himself had spoken of being left behind enemy lines and sending radio signals for help that was never to come.  He and his unit are the ones who should be dead. 

Within all this, our story and my photo trying to get back to England, to reach the deadline for the next day.  We drove for forty miles, slow narrow roads where snow had fallen and ice was forming, through the minefield that was the entire land.  The film had first to be processed and then scanned – jpegs were developed for this purpose, to compress a file to be wired home.  The twenty-foot satellite dish kicked out some serious radiation; you don’t go near the dish – and the cost for transmission, $30 a minute.  The first attempt failed after about five minutes.  And so it went, 10 minutes and failure, 15 and failure.  On the fourth or fifth attempt the picture got through.  Would the story run?  Would the photo editor approve my picture?  I had no way of knowing, but as we drove back through the night I remember looking out from the back of the Landrover, it had no seats, just rucksacks for padding and a canvas top flapping in the wind.  Headlights from a stray car shone on the rocks of the mountain road and I wore a simple smile.      

The magical power of a photo

So what is the magic of photography and what of the magic in the first image I saw?  Perhaps not the first image, but the first I can remember was from a family album.  Simple remembrance of past experience that binds us together, there is something sacred in there.  And the simple seeing of a likeness of me – “So that is what I look like.” 

It was only at second glance that this image made it into my selection.  It speaks of connections and the amazing power photography has over us all.  On one level our entire experience of the world has been transformed by the existence of photography – we can understand pretty much anything by looking at a photo and before photography our experience of the world was limited to the things we could experience first hand. 

Photography may bring us secondhand information but it is the only art form that has the potential to reveal things that can be accepted as fact.  Sure there are many other art forms but nothing has the ability to capture reality like a photograph, it makes photography unique and it is deeply ironic that so many images are edited to look like art, they trade in the most potent aspect of the original image.  

The first professional photos that caught my attention captured a harsh reality.  They were in a series by FSA (Farm Security Administration) photographers sent out to capture the plight of those struggling through the dust bowl of the 1930’s.  Photographers like Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange captured the heart and soul of people who did not know if they were going to survive.  The photos said it all.  They captured an emotion that cut to the core and moved people to action.  No need for words.

And as for this image?  It is simple – it captures the magic of seeing a likeness.  It is the same likeness that binds us all together. 

World Refugee Day

This photograph was taken on a rainy day – in fact when I left Beirut the rain was torrential, it seemed madness to set off to photograph a refugee camp on a day like this.   But it was the best day to capture what life is really like for these people.  The day before had been sunny, not only would the light have been harsh, everyone and the whole situation would have looked bright.  But the future for these people is anything but bright.  They may want to return home but the armed struggle and rise of ISIS makes this little more than a dream.  The light was perfect and the pictures tell the story, sure I got soaked through to the skin, my camera too – but this is what we must do if we want others to see what life is like for those living on the edge of survival. 

Each year in June, World Refugee Day marks another time to remember and act on behalf of refugees.  Worldwide over 40 million are displaced from their homes, mostly as a result of conflict.  When I met Syrian refugees last year everyone said they wanted to return home.  For them life is marked by three things, trauma, fear and the struggle to survive.  Syria accounts for about 9 million displaced people but we have been hearing many other stories.  Thousands escaping from North Africa – and then in Nepal after the earthquake in April this year, 8,000 dead and 2.8 million displaced.  Five years on from the devastating earthquake in Haiti, of the 1.5 million who were initially displaced 85,000 are still living in temporary shelter. 

This is a day to step up and make a difference, it may not solve the problem but it will make a difference.  Don't forget and let your voice be heard.

http://www.unhcr.org/refugeeday/us/

How far should we go?

Within the world of photography there is a clear divide between straight photography and the pictorialists.  One holds never to manipulate an image and the other to distort it out of reality.  For me this is a difficult line.   When an image becomes a piece of art does it change the reality of the struggles of those in it?  Not always, becomes my answer.  Now, if we remove vital details for sure it crosses the line, but if the image becomes more compelling, more striking, has more emotional impact without changing the reality then I think it is worth it.

This image of Syrian refugees was in my mind before I left home – that I found it was an amazing moment.  The girl in the foreground is Miriam.  After a bombing raid she had been injured in the face and when this photo was taken the doctors had just observed that she could smile again.  As refugees, the family long to return home to their farm and live in peace, but there is still no end in sight for this ongoing conflict leaving over nine million displaced from their homes.

Now, for me the question, 'How far should we go?' is compelling for another reason too.  I remember a story I once heard about two sons.  They were both asked by their father to go out and do some work.  One said, “Sure Dad, you’ve got it.”  The other was not enthusiastic and said so.  And so the story unfolds, the one with the positive words got distracted and never got to the task, but the other quietly got to it and worked hard until the job was complete.  We all know that words are cheap and that it is what we do that matters.  And so I ask this question first to myself.  I hope my answer always remains the same, "To the ends of the earth, Dad.”      

Getting Beneath the Skin

It’s been while since my last post, hopefully I will get back in the flow and my plan is to write about a single image. 

Getting beneath the skin is a difficult task, the kind of thing that we hear photographers speaking about but without a clear idea of how to get there.  It speaks of our quest for the truth in photographs, and given that photography is the only art medium that allows us to capture reality, this is no small thing to squander. 

My goal in this photograph was simple, to answer the question, ‘How does she feel when I am not there?’  The photograph itself gives the answer.  It comes from a clear working method.  

Now, one of the reasons I love National Geographic is that it is a picture driven publication.  Most of their photographers take thousands of images and a part of this is that the camera itself is the tool of exploration.  On a trip to Lebanon I found myself shooting on the street with a discreet camera, observing people going about their business, a couple sitting in a crowded café or, as on one occasion, in a coffee shop where on one table there were two young friends in modern clothes, chatting about the day, on the next table old friends in traditional clothing.  Times are changing and it is this kind of image that allows us to see how.

Sebastião Salgado remains one of my photographic hero’s and many years ago he spoke about the need to detach from preconceived notions of a situation to really be able to explore and understand.  I have never had much extra time to spend while on assignment, there has always been the pressure to hit the ground and start shooting.  Within this I developed a method of question and answer.  I ask myself a question and seek out the answer with my camera.  I have a standard set of questions, the two most important are, ‘What is it like when I am not here with my camera?’ and, ‘What is the most important thing in the lives of the people I am photographing?’  I have found the results always bring home the bacon and help me get beneath the skin with the story that really matters.

REPORT BACK: West Africa Food Crisis, Mali 2012

Long Road to Normal:  Mali 2012

As the food crisis continues across West Africa Mali faces a double challenge.

Jihadist rebels have taken over the North and the local population, both Moslems and Christians are at risk of violence and death, not only from starvation but now also at the hands of the rebels.   

Sisly Niaga is blind but along with six others he was able to escape.  He walked three days and three nights, with just a bottle of water and eating nothing.  He spoke of acts of violence against women and his sister Miriam, and other atrocities.  He called the rebels devils. 

Sisly is now in Bamako, the capital of Mali, and he is safe.  But for the most vulnerable, the young and elderly, those unable to make the journey - they now face the unthinkable.

But there is the possibility of hope for these people.  The Red Cross in Mali has plans to transport and distribute 312 metric tonnes of rice over the next three months, until the next harvest. 

They will cross rebel lines and risk everything to save these people.  But, as in the words of Aboul Cisse, the president of the Red Cross in Mali, “If they do not get this aid they face a catastrophe, people will die of hunger.”

Each one of us can continue to help.  By giving the little we can we will know we have done our part for this crisis.  We will pass on 100% of your gift to the Red Cross in Mali.

Donations can be made to:  Community Partnership/Sahel, PO Box 2172, Clayton, GA 30525, USA

On behalf of the people in Mali, thank you.