Black_White_Photography_-_Winter_2014

10

B+W

From Medina to Jordan Border, Saudi Arabia: From Train Stations of the Hejaz Railway in Saudi Arabia 2003 by Ursula Schultz-Dornburg.

Purchased by Tate with funds provided by the Photography Acquisitions Committee 2012.

focusing on the importance of the time taken

to reflect and form different perspectives.

Conflict, Time, Photography focuses on this

passing of time as its central theme.

Abandoning both the instantaneity

of photojournalism and the history of

aftermath photography, the show highlights

the importance of retrospect through the

unorthodox way in which it is sequenced;

rather than a chronological display of images

of conflict, the exhibition is arranged in

relation to how long after an event the

images were made, beginning with works

made ‘moments later’, then moving to

images taken ‘weeks to months later’,

followed by works made ‘10 to 25 years

later’ and so on, until the final room of the

exhibition with works made ‘100 years later’.

The viewer is constantly shifting between

different conflicts and geographies,

and in one room will encounter works

from Afghanistan in 2001, Iraq in 2008,

Hiroshima in 1945 and Vietnam in 1968

all taken ‘moments later’.

D

ealing with such a varied subject

matter the exhibition is broad and

far-reaching, but may not contain

the typical war photographs

one might expect. There are well-known

historic images such as Roger Fenton’s

work from the Crimean War, and George

‘In the weeks and months

following World War I there

was an abundance of images

documenting the ruined towns

and cities in the north

east of France.’

© Ursula Schultz-Domburg

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