WAR PHOTOGRAPHY. More than 90 percent of soldiers survive their wounds in the Iraq war. This is, of course, a positive development. But recovery is a long, difficult process often done in isolation. The producers of a new HBO documentary, "Alive Day Memories: Home From Iraq," which will air in September, and photographer Nina Berman, who is showing her work at the Jen Bekman Gallery in New York, are hoping to change that. Their images of maimed soldiers, trying to rebuild their lives after the war capture the experience, are searing. In one of Berman's photos, a 21-year-old bride is standing next to a badly disfigured groom at their Illinois wedding. Her expression is blank. His is unreadable: He lost his nose and chin in a suicide-bomb attack. These two projects are long overdue.
The Iraq war has been one of the most obsessively documented -- by journalists and soldiers alike -- yet the picture of post-war recovery is still murky for most Americans. It has just not been something that people want to deal with (as Holland Cotter pointed out in the Times, the photo of the Illinois wedding couple was shot on assignment for People magazine but was not used for the story; instead, the photo editors chose a more upbeat picture of the wedding party). But these experiences are part of the Iraq war.
At a memorial service I attended in Fort Lewis, Washington, on August 8, two slain soldiers, Cpl. Rhett Butler, 22, of Fort Worth, Texas, and Cpt. Brandon M. Craig, 25, of Earleville, Maryland, were honored. Evergreen Chapel was filled with survivors -- soldiers who had been to Iraq -- as well as soldiers who were on their way. Many of them walked with the help of crutches, or had bandaged arms and swollen feet poking out of casts, or were otherwise stitched up, showing in a relatively minor way that the effects of the war reach beyond the death ledgers -- and has yet to be tallied. It is possible these two new shows, "Alive Day" and Berman's photo exhibit, are signs that Americans are now more willing to look at lingering aspects of this war.
--Tara McKelvey
