Hello everyıne! 

 

I am sure you were waiting impatiently for the second part of my famous photographers series. 

 

Here we go, then! 

Famous photographers’ series part two will continue with Robert Capa’s story in this post.

 

Second World War: an important event for photojournalism and Capa

 

The Second World War, which has an important place in the history of photojournalism, was also photographed by Capa, Chim and Bresson. In this war, where the importance of propaganda was understood, efforts were made especially by the intellectuals, who were on the side of the republicans, in every field to gain support in the world public opinion. Picasso and Miro with their paintings and propaganda posters, Bresson with two documentaries, Capa, Chim and Gerda Taro with photographs, and Lorca took part in the republican side with his poems.

 

The war left important marks on Capa’s life in two respects. First, his love, Gerda Taro, was crushed to death under a tank while working at the front. Second, the photographs he took in this war brought him his first reputation for a lifetime. Especially the photograph he took near Cerro Muriano, showing the moment when a republican soldier was shot, turned into a war photo icon called “The Falling Soldier”. The photo became the most famous and most discussed photograph of his professional life. This photo was first published in Vu, then Paris Soir and Regards. It was eventually published in Life, and the Picture Post declared Capa “the world’s best war photographer” for his work in Spain.

 

A few months after General Franco declared his victory and Spain took over 36 years of fascist rule, the real great war began. At six o’clock in the morning on September 1, 1939, Germany entered Poland. Two days later, both France and Britain were at war with Germany. Capa went to the USA in October. He did some work in the USA and Mexico for Life and other media. But what he really wanted was to go back to Europe and photograph the Second World War.

 

Unfortunate dark room event

 

In 1942, he went to England with an offer he received from Collier magazine. He did a couple of photo-interviews here. In 1943, he captured the struggle of the allies in North Africa against the troops of the famous German commander Romel. Passing to Italy from there, Capa met another photographer who, like himself, was working for Life in Italy, Naples, where German troops were leaving. This was their first encounter with George Rodger, one of the founders of Magnum. But for Capa, the most important job he did in the Second World War was that he went to see the famous Normandy landing on the beach of Omaha, the area where the landing was the bloodiest and the most difficult, with the first wave arrivals. Capa took 106 frames of photographs. But the darkroom assistant in London accidentally dried the negatives at too much heat, causing many images to melt. Only eight frames remained intact, and these were among the unforgettable photos of the Second World War and the history of war photography.

 

However, this was not Capa’s last job in the Second World War. In one of the last major operations of the war in March 1945, he joined American paratroopers and photographed the landing operation on the Rhine. Then he went to Paris and from here returned to America.

 

His short relationship with the famous movie star Ingrid Bergman, whom he met in Paris, caused him to be in Hollywood for a while and photographing for Life. He always had in mind to establish a formation that would allow photographers to escape the pressure of editors and have their own negatives, and thus the idea of Magnum was born.

 

Note: In this blog post, I get help from the famous book of Russell Miller and the website of The International Center of Photography (ICP). If you want to take a look here is the info; Miller, Russell. Magnum: Fifty Years at the Front Line of History, Grove Pres, New York, 1997. ICP: www.icp.org.