Book review
This is a horrible book.
And an amazing book.
It shows what human beings can do to each other in a warzone. It is not pleasant reading, but Danish photographer Jan Grarup has never been a crowd pleaser.
The table of content gives the scope of the locations that Jan has photographed over the years: Kashmir, Sierra Leone, Chechnya, Rwanda, Kosovo, Roma, Ramallah, Hebron, Iraq, Iran, Darfur, Central African Republic, Afghanistan, Gaza, Haiti, Somalia and Mosul. More than 400 pages in coffee table book size, filled with black and white images from the horrors of war. People killed, people on the run, people in despair, people crammed together in refugee camps. Weapons, corpses, soldiers, dust, blood, poverty.
Jan has been a warzone photographer his hole life. And he has paid and continues to pay a high price for his work. PTSD to mention one. You can’t dispute Jan’s capabilities as a photographer – every image is carefully selected, the composition is impeccable, the technical quality of the images is from the top shelf.
In the foreword Jan quotes Dr. Martin Luther King jr. saying “The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people, but the silence over that by the good people.” – I think this sums up the mission Jan is on: to wake up the good people.
PS: I don’t think this book is available anymore from new. With a bit of good luck you may find a used copy. You won’t get mine. Good luck hunting.
PS: It is a BIG book. Even for a coffee table book sized book, it is bigger than most: 39cm tall and 28 cm wide, and with a weight around 3,2 kilo!
Related reading
Landscape photographer of the year, collection 10
The Photography Bible by Michael Freeman
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