July 2010 - Page 3 of 3 - Reading The Pictures

John Moore Photo July 10, 2010

BagNewsSalon: The Great Oil Spill

Slideshow, video archive and selected quotes from the online BagNewsSalon: Looking at America's Great Oil Spill, held Sunday, July 18. Featuring John Moore - photographer/Getty Pictures; Erika Blumenfeld - Artist and Documentary Photographer; Kari Goodnough - photographer/Bloomberg Photos; Loret Steinberg - Professor of Photojournalism and Documentary Photography/R.I.T.; Nathan Stormer...

Culture Focus Photo

Assuming They're "Illegals"

Accompanying a NYT story about the Administration using employment audits to crack down on employers for hiring undocumented workers, the photo does a rare thing, both perceptually and editorially. It encourages us to think about, differentiate and consider the legal circumstances of this group of individuals.

Race Focus Photo

Oakland BART Shooting: Was He Even Looking?

Whether the shooting was committed out of panic, confusion, rage, or a combination of the three, the photo represents a horrible irony between Mr. Grant's role of victim as well as spectator as well as witness for having generated such a confounding piece of evidence.

Culture Focus Photo July 9, 2010

Your Turn: Iranian Revolution Coming to a Head

There are only a few images in circulation showing the new guidelines for male hairstyles approved by the Iranian Ministry and Culture set to be unveiled (so to speak) at the “Modesty and Veil Festival” later this summer. I'm interested in how you read these cuts -- and...

John Lucaites Photo July 7, 2010

Flag Fetish

There is of course nothing wrong in celebrating America’s heritage with displays of the flag, especially on the anniversary of our national “birth,” but notice here how the elongated flag (one of three in the photograph) is completely out of scale with its surroundings—both in size and dimension—as if...

Iraq and Afghanistan War Photo

Afghanistan: Across The Chasm

It's not like this "through-the-window" effect hasn't been used before. The way Chris Hondros is employing it now, though, in Afghanistan, emphasizes a slightly different point.

Media Focus Photo July 6, 2010

The Economist v Obama

If the explanation the Economist Deputy Editor offered the NYT is disingenuous, it does serve to telegraph their motive. Emma Duncan said the magazine wasn't trying to make a political point, but that's exactly what they were doing.

Photo July 5, 2010

Charmed, I’m Sure

As the Senate Judiciary Committee sets July 13 as the date to vote on the nomination to the Supreme Court, “charming” is emerging as the unlikely frame for Elena Kagan’s performance last week. Slate sums it up when they proclaim that Kagan has “charmed and disarmed every step of...

Afghanistan Photo

July 4th: Dover and New York

The Fourth of July in America: Scenes from Dover and New York

Photo July 4, 2010

BAG Archive Edition: War Time in America

Archive Note: This post appeared on November 18, 2007 featuring the cover image from “Homeland,” contributor Nina Berman’s new book. (Full disclosure: Michael Shaw wrote the afterward.) The image raises the question of whether Americans really did then and do now consider themselves and the country “at war.” The mix...

Afghanistan Photo July 2, 2010

Waiting Your Turn in the Machinery of Death

This photograph from Kabul, Afghanistan could have been captioned “Return of the Body Snatchers.” Gallows humor is pretty cheap, but it may be as sane a response as any other to another suicide bombing. The attack last week killed 18 people, wounded at least 47 others, and generally made...

Photo July 1, 2010

Gulf Update: The Wave

The way this chocolate wave, captured by Getty photographer Joe Raedle, captures the total presence of oil, so much so that the sea looks less like water than a physical wall, it makes it easy to grasp what has otherwise been a more abstract idea of "how much" and...