This is issue #3 of a recurring series about the great photographers that shaped the art as we know it today. Click this if you missed Part 2!
Robert Capa
October 22, 1913- May 25, 1954
Robert Capa was born as Endre Friedmann on October 22, 1913, in Budapest, Hungary. From a young age, his life was marked by turmoil, as political repression required him to leave Hungary at age 18. Having fled to Berlin he began working as a darkroom assistant and soon discovered photography. However, this too would be short lived, as the rise of the Nazi regime forced him to uproot himself once again and led him to settle in Paris in 1933.
In Paris, Endre Friedmann became Robert Capa, a trick used by Capa and his girlfriend Gerda Taro to recreate him as a famous American photographer and help boost his career. Despite the ruse being quickly discovered the name stuck and Endre Friedmann would go on to be known as Robert Capa for the rest of his life.
In 1936 Robert Capa documented his first major conflict, the Spanish Civil War. Accompanying Earnest Hemmingway and the Republican forces, he would take some of his most iconic images during this time. Apart from his photographic success, the war also formed him in a different way: It was during this war, that his lover Gerda Taro was killed whilst photographing the Battle of Brunete, ultimately uprooting Capa for good and giving him a very personal taste of what war actually means. Robert Capas time in Paris and the Spanish Civil War allowed him to meet many other famous photographers, such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and David "Chim" Seymour with whom he would later found Magnum Photos.
Capa was living in New York when World War 2 broke out in Europe and he quickly made every effort to be able to document the war. Due to Capa's early life in Budapest and Berlin, he was considered an "enemy alien" and initially had great difficulty trying to get assigned to Europe. Eventually, he was allowed to go and went on to document the war from the battles in North Africa to the invasion of Sicily. He returned to England just in time to get caught up in the preparations for the D-Day landings, where he would end up being the only photographer in the first wave of the Omaha Beach landings. Armed with nothing but a camera he was in the middle of the carnage of the first wave. He shot four rolls during the landings, but a nervous darkroom assistant ruined all but 11 of the images. These images would go on to be known as the "Magnificent Eleven" and were the primary inspiration for the opening scenes of the movie Saving Private Ryan. Robert Capa's work in Europe was arguably his greatest and stands as a testament to the dedication a combat photographer has to show in order to truly document the reality of war from the common soldiers perspective.
In 1947 Dwight D. Eisenhower presented Robert Capa with the Medal of Freedom for his images of World War 2.
After World War 2 Capa went on to found Magnum Photos with Henri Cartier-Bresson, David "Chim" Seymour and George Rodger. He would go on to document the founding of the state of Israel and the subsequent Arab-Israeli War.
His next few years were spent in the capacity of a "roving photographer", going wherever Magnum Photos needed him and he spent a few years photographing civilian life and film productions.
Robert Capa's final assignment was the First Indochina War in 1954, where he was embedded with French soldiers. He was there to photograph the final days of the war as the French forces retreated when on May 25, 1954, he stepped on a landmine that killed him instantly.
Capa redefined the concept of a war photographer and arguably created the concept of combat photography. His method of embedding with soldiers and living their everyday life as one of them has inspired many war photographers to this day and given the rest of the world a rare insight into the reality of what war is really like.
As usual, I will send you off with a few iconic images.
!WARNING! Due to the nature of Robert Capa's work, some of the images will contain death and violence. If you are not comfortable seeing such images I would advise you not to scroll down any further.
Source The Falling Soldier, Spain 1945
Source Omaha Beach Landing, D-Day, 1944
Source 82nd Airborne, Saint Sauveur le Vicomte, France 1944
Source The Last Man to Die, Leipzig, Germany 1945
Source Paratrooper Jim Conboy of the 513th HQ Company preparing for Operation Varsity, 1945
"If your pictures aren't good enough, you aren't close enough."
-Robert Capa
