Bitter fruit
Saturday 27 August 2005
That fine photographer Paul Fusco has recorded the funerals of American soldiers killed in Iraq. He has web-published 44 of his pictures, with his voice-over narrative, under the title Bitter fruit.
Fusco is passionate, and thoroughly engaged with his subject. He takes us along on his private and independent quest. He is the antithesis of the embedded reporter. The work is published by Magnum Photos, the agency owned by Fusco and other photographers.
Frame 42. …and Kira and her family heard the volley of gunfire…(sounds of rifle fire, then a bugle). [from the soundtrack]
I don’t expect to get published in the United States. I don’t expect the big magazines in the United States to publish it. I’m not doing it for them. I’m doing it for us. I’m doing it for the people. That loss, that pain. that suffering — we’ve got to understand that. We are responsible. We are committed.. We should be committed to understanding the loss in this awful war. [from Paul Fusco’s voice narration]