The Ethics of Representation - A Follow-Up

As a follow up to this post yesterday, and to a couple of others from earlier in the year, I want to recommend this short video interview with Don McCullin at The Guardian. I thank Tim Atherton for bringing it to my attention. In general, McCullin's reflections - the straightforward moral seriousness with which he speaks of his life and experience - really do challenge those who treat photographers of war and disaster as ethically defective. More specifically, it makes me wonder whether Sean O'Hagan recalls having spoken with McCullin a month or so ago. If so, I am not sure how he could have written the column I criticized yesterday. It is all a bit mystifying.

McCullin's Landscape

Towards an Iron Age hill fort, Somerset, 1991.
Photograph © Don McCullin.

As a follow-up to yesterday's post on Don McCullin, and prompted by a comment by Tom White, here is an example of the landscape work that McCullin has done in recent years.

There is a moving interview with Don McCullin

Don McCullin, 2008. Photograph © Felix Clay.

. . . here at The Guardian. McCullin seems like a remarkable man. He makes clear the the alleged glamor of being a photographer of war and mayhem is an illusion: "Some times it felt like I was carrying pieces of human flesh back home with me, not negatives. It's as if you are carrying the suffering of the people you have photographed."