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The war image as the creator of opinions

“My book Inferno is a record of what happened during the final decade of the 20th century. We are talking about crimes against humanity linked together in more or less obvious ways,” says the war photographer James Nachtwey.

“Take the example of U.S. policy in Somalia. The mission began with goodwill and good intentions and was effective. That mission was to protect the distribution of food relief to famine victims. When it turned into a political mission to disarm the militias and then to go after one of the warlords, it changed dramatically and turned into a disaster. That disaster was what prompted Bill Clinton to turn his back on Rwanda. He didn´t want to get burned again in Africa… And when Kosovo came around, when the Serbs began to ethnically cleanse Kosovo, I think the international community understood it couldn´t turn its back on Kosovo the way it had on Rwanda. There´s a connection there,” he says. His book ends in Kosovo.

James Nachtwey grew up in Massachusetts and graduated from Dartmouth College where he studied Art History and Political Science while teaching himself photography, He worked aboard ships in the Merchant Marine, as an apprentice news film editor and a truck driver. For four years he was a newspaper photographer in New Mexico, and in 1980 he moved to New York to begin a career as a freelance magazine photographer. His first foreign assignment was to cover civil strife in Northern Ireland in 1981 during the IRA hunger strike.

Since then he has devoted himself to documenting wars, conflicts and social issues worldwide. He has worked extensively in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza, Israel, India, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, the Philippines, South Korea, Somalia, Sudan, Brazil, Rwanda, South Africa, Russia, Bosnia, Chechnya, Romania, Viet Nam, and throughout Indonesia and Eastern Europe. His work has appeared regularly in many of the finest international publications, including Time, Life, New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, National Geographic, Stern, Geo, El Pais, L´Express and many others. He has been a contract photographer with Time since 1984, and a member of Magnum since 1986.

James Nachtwey is concerned with the photograph as a creator of opinion. If people are confronted in the press with injustices and crimes against humanity they will engage themselves with the issues. That’s how public opinion is created and that´s how it stays alive, he says.
James Nachtwey thinks the raising of people´s consciousness is the first step toward creating public opinion and public opinion creates an impetus for change. It creates pressure on decision makers, the powers that be, who make choices that affect the lives of thousands of people. Helping create the impetus for them to move in the right direction, through public opinion, is something worth doing.
“Many politicians find public opinion annoying. It gets in their way. And indeed it should get in their way. It should help divert them to the right course,” he says.

His books include Deeds of War published in 1989 and Infrno published in 1999. He has had one-man exhibitions at the International Center of Photography in New York, the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College, the Carolinum in Prague, the Hasselblad Center in Sweden, the Canon Gallery, the Nisuwe Kirke in Amsterdam, and Massachusetts College of Art, where he was awarded an honorary doctorate.

A Canon Explorer of Light, he has been awarded Magazine Photographer of the Year six times, the Robert Capa Gold Medal four times, the World Press Photo Award twice, the International Center of Photography Infinity Award twice, the Leica Award twice, the Overseas Press Club Award for Best Photo Reporting from Abroad twice, the Canon Photo Essayist Award, the Eugene Smith Memorial Grant, the Bayeaux Award for War Correspondents, the Sprague Award (the highest award given by the National Press Photographers Association), and most recently the 2000 Alfred Eisenstaedt Award for magazine photography for single image–journalistic impact.

Stringer for Time Magazine fra 1984.
Medlem av Magnum Photos fra 1986 til 2001.
Utgitt “Deeds of War” 1989.
Utgitt “Inferno” 1999.
Dan David Prize, 2003.
Robert Capa Gold Medal, 1983, 1984, 1986, 1994, 1998.
Magazine Photographer of the Year, 1983, 1986, 1988, 1990, 1992,1994, 2002, 2003.
World Press Award, 1992, 1994. Common Wealth Award, 2001.
Dr. Jean Mayer Global Citizenship Award, Tufts University, 2003.
Martin Luther King Award, Dartmouth College, for promoting human rights, 2002.
Henry Luce Award, Time, Inc., 2002.
Eugene Smith Memorial Grant, 1994.
Infinity Award, International Center of Photography, 1991, 1993, 2000.
Lou Stoumen Prize, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, 2001.
Fund for Investigative Journalism Grant, 2001.
Alfred Eisenstadt Award, 1999.
Bayeaux Award for War Correspondents, France,1995, 1998.
Canon Photo Essayist Award, 1992.
Nikon World Image Award, New School for Social Research, 1991.
Leica Award, New School for Social Research, 1989, 1990.
Budapest Photographic Festival Award, 1985.
Nikon Award, 1985.
Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society.