Title: Barbican - This is War! (Robert Capa at work) & Gerda Taro (a retrospective)
Rating (out of 100): 60
Mood: depressing, sad, introspective, weighed down by history and war
Timeout / Culture Critic: http://www.timeout.com/london/art/event/9218/robert-capa.html / na
Barbican: This is War! (Robert Capa at work) & Gerda Taro a retrospective (Gallery Level 3): The show presents black and white photographs of wartime and conflicts from Robert Capa (one of the pre-eminent wartime photojournalists) and Gerda Taro (the first female photographer working on the frontline, who was unfortunately killed in action). Covering various conflicts, from Spain, to China and Germany from 1936 – 1945, the photos are probably more interesting for a true student of history. Or somebody who is perhaps older and may have a personal connection with some of these events. Otherwise, from strictly an aesthetic viewpoint, the photos get old really quickly (how many relatively small military photos can you look at). And of course, some of the shots are impressive in terms of how close the photographers must have been to the action to take them, but still, aside from that, strictly as a visual medium, I didn’t find them all that fascinating. The ones that I did find the most interesting were Capa’s Refugees from Barcelona, showing the suffering of the aftermath of conflict (no guns, no blood, just a lot of emotional and physical pain). At the Capa show, there are several quotes (presumably his) painted on the walls to provide some insight into the photojournalist’s mind. The one that struck me the most is not the most often quoted one about how you have to get closer to the action, but rather the one about the range of emotions in war – “In a war, you must hate somebody or love somebody; you must have a position or you cannot stand what goes on.” Some of Gerda Taro’s photos showing close-ups of civilians in war-time (children eating, etc.) were also interesting although her work only takes up a couple of rooms. Overall, not the most interesting of shows and definitely you must be really into war-time photography and perhaps know the full context of history for this to be very interesting. For the average viewer, probably not worth the visit.
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