Magnum Magnum

I picked up a copy of Magnum Magnum before we departed Edinburgh last August. It's a mammoth book of very high quality. It's layout is quite unique, with each Magnum photographer choosing 6 photographs taken by another Magnum photographer. This means that the photos chosen are not necissarily really well known photos, which results in a fascinating in-depth review of some of the best 20th century photographers work, each with a small history of the photographer and a short essay by the Magnum member choosing the work.

To look at photographs and feel your heart quicken, and almost bring tears to your eyes. That is what some of the best photographs in this book did to me. That and laugh out loud and wonder in amazement how the photographer 'saw' that photo _and_ managed to capture it on film/ccd. Incredible array of photos, from the banal to the heart-wrenchingly passionate.

Can art change the world? (this is a quote... I just finished last night watching the final episode of Simon Schama's 'Power of Art' - awesome awesome show) I certainly believe that photographs can and have changed the world. Debatable for the good or not however. I remember reading an account of somebody who first saw (I think it was) Lee Millers photographs taken in Germany at the end of WW2 and was struck by the violence and destruction of humanity and forever remembers the moment he/she saw the photographs. Now (21st century underway) we see the destruction of a town (I'm thinking here of the Brisbane floods and QLD cyclone in the last few weeks) online, on the tv, radio, twitter, facebook constantly recorded and viewed around the globe - the same of the recent Egypt demonstrations. Are we now dulled to such images of destruction and does it now mean that the photographs (and other media) hold less sway over us and make us actually feel _less_ now than ever before? Nonetheless, even though I've been exposed to the average level of images that a person has, I was still moved by many of the images in this book. It shows the good, bad and ugly (and some funny too) side of humanity, all captured by a brilliant set of women and men behind their respective cameras.

Well worth a read.