Tag Archives: photography

“The Living Dead of Buchenwald” (Margaret Bourke-White)

Posted on November 9, 2014 by zjb

This iconic image was shot by Margaret Bourke-White. It became known as “The Living Dead of Buchenwald.” Like many others, I’ve seen it how many times reproduced in so many books? It was on view at a big Bourke-White show at Syracuse. … Continue reading →

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Stalin’s Mother (Ketevan Geladze) (Margaret Bourke-White)

Posted on November 8, 2014 by zjb

It’s a pretty famous picture, but it caught me up short, when I saw it just recently for the first time. Stalin had a mother. Her name was Ketevan Geladze. This is what she looked like, caught up close in this … Continue reading →

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History, Technology, Photography (Margaret Bourke-White)

Posted on November 6, 2014 by zjb

I took a bunch of pictures of photographs at the Margaret Bourke-White exhibition that showed here at Syracuse University early this semester. Bourke-White’s photographs appeared in Life Magazine. Hugely important, they mark out the latter part of the first half … Continue reading →

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Humanism, Modernism, Socialism (Paul Strand Photographs

Posted on October 26, 2014 by zjb

Always in search of classical American visual vernacular, if I had the time I’d go straight to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to see the Paul Strand retrospective. I’ll have to make do with the article by Karen Rosenberg here … Continue reading →

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Burnt Mosque, Racist Graffiti, And Uprooted Olive Tree (Atrocity Aesthetics)

Posted on October 15, 2014 by zjb

But the photographs, the photographs of the burnt mosque and racist graffiti at the town of Aqraba in the West Bank not far from Nablus are too beautiful for such an ugly thing. I saw them  in this article here at Ynet. … Continue reading →

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Disaster Aesthetics (Syria)

Posted on October 14, 2014 by zjb

Abstract and beautiful, the satellite images published here in the Atlantic show the devastating scale of the chaotic free-for-all in Syria that mars that country’s natural and urban landscapes. Without a human figure, they indicate from a distance a destructive human trace. … Continue reading →

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Hajj Selfie

Posted on October 5, 2014 by zjb

Conservative clerics object and might even threaten, but what’s not to like? The critics contend that it’s a kind of showing off. But all I see are happy people. The Hajj selfies are adorable. An open window, they put a … Continue reading →

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Steven Sotloff Photograph

Posted on September 4, 2014 by zjb

Please don’t unfriend me for posting this photograph of Steven Sotloff caught just before his murder. Yesterday I posted on FB an article from Al-Arabiya reporting on the condemnation of mainstream Muslim authorities in the Middle East against this despicable … Continue reading →

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Pictures & Stories (Gaza 2014)

Posted on July 22, 2014 by zjb

FB friends, please do not open this link if you can’t bear to look. The photo at the top of the post is graphic. From Gaza, terrible pictures and terrible stories mediate or re-present, as best they can, the reality … Continue reading →

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(Photographic Portraits) Grand Dames New York (Wit and Privilege)

Posted on May 28, 2014 by zjb

This photo spread in the May 5, 2014 issue of New York Magazine caught my attention. Alongside the power of the close-framed photographic portraits, I think it is the combination of cossetted privilege and deep, knowing human wit and intelligence that … Continue reading →

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