DARFURDARFUR LIFE/WAR – a book review/spotlight

The engaging and hauntingly beautiful book DARFURDARFUR LIFE/WAR is a collection of photographs taken by former U.S. Marine Brian Steidle and photojournalists Lynsey Addario, Mark Brecke, Hélène Caux, Ron Haviv, Paolo Pellegrin, Ryan Spencer Reed, and Michal Ronnen Safdie.

To give you a sense of the photos, you can take a look of these 6 photos here – pix 1, pix 2, pix 3, pix 4, pix 5, and pix 6 with captions and photo credits.

Quoting the editor of the book Leslie Thomas (architect and curator of the Darfur/Darfur multimedia exhibition (see great interview)) (emphasis added),

“War is generally thought of in statistics about people most of us have never met, yet these beautiful and intense photographs of Darfur’s people let us see a new story. They present the individual beauty and specific brutality that coexists in this region by juxtaposing haunting images of pain with others full of tenacity, pride and hope.”

Excerpting from the above mentioned interview of Thomas in the Architectural Record (emphasis added),

Because Thomas had been so grabbed by a photograph [of a victimized child in a NYT article about the genocide in Darfur], she thought other people would too. She spoke with a documentary filmmaker friend about the possibility of creating some sort of photographic installation, and after receiving positive feedback from the photographer who had taken the photo that initially spurred her call to action, Darfur/Darfur began to take shape. […] “I thought about how a strong message could go out to people using beautiful imagery in a museum setting.”

The beautiful yet haunting book DARFURDARFUR LIFE/WAR serves to remind us the genocide in Darfur and call for actions from us. Get a copy of DARFURDARFUR LIFE/WAR and see for yourself. Now, if you will be in Calgary from March 14 – March 21, 2008, you can come see the Darfur/Darfur multimedia exhibition yourself and get involved.

I would like to conclude this entry with one of the quotes I love by Margaret Mead,

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

P.S. During my research for this entry, I found the following video and pictures,

1. Quicktime slide show with beautiful music of some photos by Ryan Spencer Reed
2. Here is an video interview of Ryan
3. Surviving Darfur: Photographer on Life in the Camps – National Geographic News with links to pictures by Hélène Caux

For this entry, I decided to focus on the book and simply link to my previous outrage about the inadequate actions in halting the Darfur Genocide by the world governments (including the Canadian government).

P.P.S. Special thanks go to Erin in arranging a copy of the book to be FedExed to me for this review.