These apocalyptic appearing press photos of the latest events in the Ukraine were published yesterday by the spanish newspaper El País.
Immediately touched by the anarchic brutality of a real event I started to notice that the images would arouse a certain sense for surreal beauty just at the same time they had a shocking impact on me. I realized that this actually happens to me most of the time when looking at press photos of war, destruction and despair, ending up feeling uncertain about my own integrity. Why do I find beauty in so utterly terrible pictures?
It might be because of the elaborate technique/composition/quality we are used of the vast majority of documentary pictures. It certainly is also the sensibility for touching moments and the know how of a particular photographer to capture those in an aesthetic way. It might be the fact, that we, who are having the privilege to sit in our comfortable homes while watching and not being personally involved, are locally and mentally far away from the action. And then, because time always somehow stands still within this medium, it is hard to believe that what you see is actually happening – and it is happening right now, in this moment and we need to be afraid! (This is the memorization I am, so to speak, injecting my brain)
How relieving to see that the apocalypse might come to an end…
