This Is War!

Actually, this is 3 exhibitions linked by the theme of war photojournalism: Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and 4 modern responses to Afghanistan and Iraq. War photography is a strange genre. On the one hand, there's something inherently morbid (and possibly unethical) about photographing people suffering and dying in the midst of war. On the other, the power of the images can have a huge political and propaganda impact. The photos of Capa and Taro are a perfect example. Some of Capa's most famous photos are here - the Falling Soldier, the Omaha Beach landing - but especially interesting are the contact sheets showing the entire sequence of shots for certain events, and the D-Day and Leipzig pictures subjected to the censor's pen with key landmarks scribbled out, and the face of a soon-to-be-killed gunner blocked out. The images of the young soldier lying in an ever-expanding pool of blood are deeply poignant. Equally moving and shocking is the small Chinese boy lying dead between the chicken and piglet he failed to save from the Japanese gunfire. Nor is it just male photographers who produced such powerful images. Taro's photos of Valencia air raid victims lying in the morgue are as disturbing as anything on show either by Capa or the modern artists such as Geert van Kesteren, with his photos of post-Saddam Iraq. The grief and disbelief on the faces of the Iraqis digging up mass graves prove that war is anything but glorious.