Picture of the Day

xebex · Aug 7, 2009

The Afghan Girl. One of the greatest photo in the history of Photography.

before

year later when the same photographer took her picture again...

xebex · Aug 7, 2009

Taken by Kevin Carter. Carter became part of what was dubbed “The Bang Bang Club”, a group of journalist who got extremely close to the violence that marked the end of the apartheid era. He would receive a few accolades for photography, but no real international attention; however his moment came in Sudan in 1993. There he would seek to cover the tribulations of famine victims. Ducking away from the crowds, he would encounter a child who had collapsed from hunger.

Carter spotted a vulture approaching the child and stayed very still, as not to frighten the bird. He would wait for what he believed twenty minutes before chasing the bird away and leaving to sit under a tree, crying and smoking. The photo would become a sensation, igniting controversy over whether or not Carter should have helped the child in the photo. Carter would slowly slip into depression and drug use. However his life took a brief upturn with winning the Pulitzer Prize.

The photographer committed suicide on July 27th 1994.

Xeric · Aug 8, 2009

A1Kaid · Aug 8, 2009

xebex said:
Taken by Kevin Carter. Carter became part of what was dubbed “The Bang Bang Club”, a group of journalist who got extremely close to the violence that marked the end of the apartheid era. He would receive a few accolades for photography, but no real international attention; however his moment came in Sudan in 1993. There he would seek to cover the tribulations of famine victims. Ducking away from the crowds, he would encounter a child who had collapsed from hunger.

Carter spotted a vulture approaching the child and stayed very still, as not to frighten the bird. He would wait for what he believed twenty minutes before chasing the bird away and leaving to sit under a tree, crying and smoking. The photo would become a sensation, igniting controversy over whether or not Carter should have helped the child in the photo. Carter would slowly slip into depression and drug use. However his life took a brief upturn with winning the Pulitzer Prize.

The photographer committed suicide on July 27th 1994.

This is a historical and memorable photo, it is considered top of the class photography. I have seen it before and this photo is the epitome of the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words"...

"In March 1993 Carter made a trip to southern Sudan. The sound of soft, high-pitched whimpering near the village of Ayod attracted Carter to an emaciated Sudanese toddler. The girl had stopped to rest while struggling to a feeding center, whereupon a vulture had landed nearby. He said that he waited about 20 minutes, hoping that the vulture would spread its wings. It didn't. Carter snapped the haunting photograph and chased the vulture away [2]. However, he also came under heavy criticism for just photographing — and not helping — the little girl:

"The man adjusting his lens to take just the right frame of her suffering might just as well be a predator, another vulture on the scene."[3]

The photograph was sold to The New York Times where it appeared for the first time on March 26, 1993. Practically overnight hundreds of people contacted the newspaper to ask whether the child had survived, leading the newspaper to run a special editor's note saying the girl had enough strength to walk away from the vulture, but that her ultimate fate was unknown.

On April 2, 1994 Nancy Buirski, a foreign New York Times picture editor, phoned Carter to inform him he had won the most coveted prize for photojournalism. Carter was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography on May 23, 1994 at Columbia University's Low Memorial Library."

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Carter

Thanks for sharing this photo. :tup: