Robert Capa - "The Greatest War Photographer in the World"
Hello, photography fans! Today I would like to talk about Robert Capa who is said to be the The Greatest War Photographer in the World. Someone who took pictures of the greatest moments of modern history. Founder of one of the most well know photography cooperative Magnum Photos. Let's check out Robert Capa.
Before we talk about Robert Capa, let me introduce to you someone very important for this story. André Friedman was Born in Budapest in 1913 and didn't have particularly dream childhood. His early life was influenced by world war 1 and his gambling father and his adventurous stories. He was actually part of kids gang roaming Budapest especially the jewish quarter in the Pest part. He actually had a nickname shark which translated in Hungarian is Capa.
He was never afraid of new things especially adventures involving danger and in his early life he became involved with leftist revolutionaries but actually never joined the communist party. During his high school years he became interested in politics and literature and decided to become journalist. However with the rising anti-semitism in Hungary it wasn't a great place to stay for Andre and when His friend Eva Besnyö went to Berlin to study photography he decided he would follow her. Through the jewish community he was able to apply to study abroad and finally move to Berlin via Prague, Vienna and Dresden.
When he was in Berlin he needed to somehow make money and since his german was still kind of limited at that time he decided to become photographer as it was the nearest thing to journalism but he didnt need the language for that. He got a job in photography company called Dephot ran by Hungarian and he worked there in a dark room. When Leon Trotsky arrived to have his speech he volunteered to photograph him.
This event kind of kick started his photography career. As the Germany in 1930s wasn't a good place for leftist jewish photographer he left for Paris. While In paris he met Gerda, who was german photographer and fled Germany for the same reasons. The two became a team and started photographing together. Also according to a book Blood and Champagne the life and times of Robert Capa by Alex Kershaw they felt in love in south France. What I felt from the books and informations I have found was - I think they cared for each other if not loved each other but there were also opinions that they were just friends and photography partners and Capa had many lovers and that Gerda actually loved someone else.
As André was still struggling with money they actually got an idea to create an association to sell photos. They formed an association of three people Gerda, Andrew and Robert Capa an American famous and rich photographer travelling Europe who just happened to be the same person as Andrew.
Because of that they ware able to sell his prints for double or even tripple prizes at that time. Gerda also changed her name to Gerda Taro.
Capa photographed 5 wars in 10 different countries and was called the greatest war photographer in the world by Picture post. actually made his name during Spanish civil war where he took this picture The falling soldier which became not only the most famous photo of Spanish civil war but also the most controversial. As Alex Kershaw wrote in his book the picture became the most debated picture in history of photojournalism. There are basically two camps. The first one says the photo is the greater war photograph and the other one that the photo was either staged and the soldier simply tripped. I would this the photo looks perfectly real to me. I will leave it up to you to decide whenever you think it is real or staged. Let me know down in the comment. It was and still is an iconic photograph.
After Spanish war he photographed Chinese resistance to Imperial Japan and after that the D-Day. He was actually the only photographer to land on Omaha Beach during the D-Day landing. He shot 4 rolls of 35 mm film and sent them to Life magazine office in London. However, there was a very unfortunate accident and Life's darkroom destroyed almost all negatives except 11. Thats just incredible when you think about how dangerous it was to take those photos. All of them were printed in the Life magazine on June 19.
In 1947 together with William Vandivert, David Seymour, George Rodger and Henri Cartier-Bresson, they founded the cooperative venture Magnum photos. The goal was to help and manage work for freelance photographers. It has been more than 72 years since the organisation started and it developed a reputation for the excellence of its photo-journalists.
Between 1948 and 1950 he visited Israel and photographed the declaration of independence and fighting that followed. My most favourite photo is probably this one. I have seen this image long before I actually found it was taken in Haifa and it documents arriving immigrant as it feels timeless. Just like a lot of his photos is has strong vertical composition.
Arriving Immigrants, Haifa, Israel, Robert Capa
During his carrier he met befriended and photographed many famous celebrities, painters, actors, writers including Ernest Hemingway , Pablo Picasso or Ingrid Bergman who actually had a love affair with Capa. There is actually a great movie about Ingrid Ingrid Bergman: In Her Own Words - I saw it just recently and liked it a lot
His last assignment took place in Vietnam during the first Indochina war. As there were landmines everywhere it was stressed out to follow the convoy and cleared roads. He said he would be totally careful except when there was only one place he could take the picture he wanted. On 25th of May in 1954 he stepped on a land mine and died. He was 40 years old.
I think - he was not only incredible war photographer but also brilliant photojournalist. Just looking at his pictures we can learn a lot not only about street photography and composition.
