The wartime photojournalist, Robert Capa, is famed for his black and white images of war. One of his most famous images was the Falling Soldier, taken as a man fell in death after being shot in Spain in 1936. The image’s proper and full name is, “Loyalist Militiaman at the Moment of Death, Cerro Muriano, September 5, 1936.”
A long title, but the image has been seen by millions over the years. Capa was noted for being somewhat reckless in his attempt to get good wartime images. As one of the founders of Magnum Photos, he is quoted as saying, “If your photographs aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.” An adage he held to until his last days. He died in 1954 in Indochina when he stepped on a landmine in an attempt to capture the action of a raging battle in the French Colonial war that was taking place at the time.
The Hungarian-Jew was born Andrè Friedmann in 1913 and always looked for action and conflict even in his younger years. As a teenager, he became entangled with revolutionaries and became embroiled in the world’s longstanding fight of anti-Semitism. When he moved to Berlin in 1931 at age 18, he became involved in photojournalism. He got up close and personal. He showed everything as it was, imperfections and all.
During the Russian Revolution, he was assigned to photograph the legendary Trotsky in Copenhagen as he spoke about the meaning of the revolution. He got his camera within a couple of feet of Trotsky and captured intimate images. His fearlessness in getting into such a close proximity of Trotsky earned him a moniker that later became his name, Capa, Hungarian for “shark”.
As anti-Jewish sentiment built in Germany in the 30’s, Capa moved to Paris. In a sheer gutsy move to sell his images for more money, he and his lover, Gerda Taro, invented the persona of an American born rich and famous photographer, Robert Capa.
The gimmick worked, and his images sold like hot cakes. Still the revolutionary at heart, Capa and Taro went to Spain to combat totalitarian regimes by shooting film instead of bullets. Capa helped found the photography co-operative Magnum Photo, named after a champagne bottle. As he continued in his pursuit to get closer to the action, he began to exhibit the symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder and suffered greatly to alcoholism.
After a near death experience in Tel Aviv in 1948, he decided to leave the Korean War for other photojournalists. Then, when working for Life magazine, he decided to go to Vietnam in order to get back into the fray and document the story that was taking place there. It was in 1954 in Thai Binh, Vietnam Capa got too close for the last time and a land mine took his life and his talent from the world.
Such photographers never truly die. They live on in their work, in the images they capture. Photography is more than taking pictures, not only does it capture the essence of a moment, but it often captures the ‘soul’ of the person capturing the images. You can get to know a bit about the photographer based upon the style, composition, and general feel of the photos. Robert Capa has not been with us since 1954, but he lives still in the photos he has given the world. We can see his spirit of adventure, his willingness to push the edge, his fearlessness, his idealism, and his personality in the photos we have. Together, they tell a story of the events of this world and they help us get to know a man who was gone before his time.
As is often the case with photography, it is more than snapping a shutter; it is about capturing a story. If we take a lesson from Frank Capa, we should learn that not only can we capture the soul and essence of the subject, but we also put a tiny piece of our own essence into the image. We can immortalize ourselves from behind the lens; what a legacy we can all have.
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