HCB trip to Russia (LIFE magazine)

[p.giannakis]

I was wondering if i should add this as a comment to the "Eastern Europe" thread or start a new thread.

There is a scan of LIFE magazine with an article from HCB's trip to Russia here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...ce=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

The second part of the article appears two issues later, found here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...ce=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

All LIFE magazine articles can be found here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...issues_r&cad=1&atm_aiy=1935#all_issues_anchor

 

[retinax]

I was wondering if i should add this as a comment to the "Eastern Europe" thread or start a new thread.

There is a scan of LIFE magazine with an article from HCB's trip to Russia here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...ce=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

The second part of the article appears two issues later, found here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...ce=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

All LIFE magazine articles can be found here:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...issues_r&cad=1&atm_aiy=1935#all_issues_anchor

Thanks, wonderful photographs!
I find it quite fascinating how at the end of the McCarthy era, stark condemnations of communism (in the pieces on automation and the Taiwan conflict/last throes of the Chinese civil war on pp. 35 and 29 resp.) coexisted in the same magazine issues with HCB's photo reportages that only criticize the SU subtly and perhaps romanticize to some degree.

 

[Nitroplait]

Those cigarette ads makes me miss the time when smoking was harmless and cool.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Thanks, wonderful photographs!
I find it quite fascinating how at the end of the McCarthy era, stark condemnations of communism (in the pieces on automation and the Taiwan conflict/last throes of the Chinese civil war on pp. 35 and 29 resp.) coexisted in the same magazine issues with HCB's photo reportages that only criticize the SU subtly and perhaps romanticize to some degree.

He was first, somewhat allowed to take pictures in Stalin Soviet. I can't recall someone else to do it before him in this style. He wasn't alone, nor was he free to photograph. He took photo of waiting line to the store without permission while in the car with his watchers.

I don't think I was able to get this book. I have his second trip book. And it is full of satire and ezop language. His feel was very close feel as some of us had. Absurd, lies and laugh via anecdotes.

 

[Erik van Straten]

Yes, there are two books of Cartier-Bresson about Russia, the first from the early fifties (only about Moscow in fact) and the second from twenty years later, covering also other parts of the Soviet Union. I very much prefer the second, although that too does not show the "less attractive" aspects of life in the Soviet-Union. It is therefore clear that he was not free to move and not free to make pictures of all the aspects of life in the USSR.


Erik.

 

[retinax]

Of course he wasn't allowed to photograph freely. But the magazine editors could have chosen not to show photographs that seem to, at least superficially, glorify or romanticise the SU, or could have added commentary on how the photographs aren't representative. Instead, the absurdities of the SU are only hinted at, in the pictures as well as in the text, like where it says that only a small upper class can afford certain items of clothing. This cautious approach of course makes sense as they wanted HCB or others to be allowed to report from the SU or brother states again.
Nonetheless I'm somewhat impressed that during those times of stuffy anti-communism, the readers of life magazine were shown these pictures pretty much without ideological "guidance". Something that seems to happen less nowadays. Some people condemn today's media for taking a stance, rather than just "giving us the facts". I don't generally follow this idea, as I don't believe there's very often such a thing as pure facts. But this gives food for thought. Life magazine is just showing the pictures, even though they very clearly aren't the whole picture, and even more so could almost be seen as pro-SU propaganda by the right. It was a different time. I wouldn't have thought the readers would be given so much credit to make of the pictures what the wanted - but I applaud it. Maybe my idea of how intense anti-communism was at the time is just exaggerated.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Of course he wasn't allowed to photograph freely. But the magazine editors could have chosen not to show photographs that seem to, at least superficially, glorify or romanticise the SU, or could have added commentary on how the photographs aren't representative. Instead, the absurdities of the SU are only hinted at, in the pictures as well as in the text, like where it says that only a small upper class can afford certain items of clothing. This cautious approach of course makes sense as they wanted HCB or others to be allowed to report from the SU or brother states again.
Nonetheless I'm somewhat impressed that during those times of stuffy anti-communism, the readers of life magazine were shown these pictures pretty much without ideological "guidance". Something that seems to happen less nowadays. Some people condemn today's media for taking a stance, rather than just "giving us the facts". I don't generally follow this idea, as I don't believe there's very often such a thing as pure facts. But this gives food for thought. Life magazine is just showing the pictures, even though they very clearly aren't the whole picture, and even more so could almost be seen as pro-SU propaganda by the right. It was a different time. I wouldn't have thought the readers would be given so much credit to make of the pictures what the wanted - but I applaud it. Maybe my idea of how intense anti-communism was at the time is just exaggerated.

I'm kind of lost. Are you saying sunny pictures from Cuba are pro Fedor Kastov family/regime propaganda?

Yes, there are two books of Cartier-Bresson about Russia, the first from the early fifties (only about Moscow in fact) and the second from twenty years later, covering also other parts of the Soviet Union. I very much prefer the second one, although that one too does not show the "less attractive" aspects of life in the Soviet-Union. It is therefore clear that he was not free to move and not free to make pictures of all the aspects of life in the USSR.


Erik.

Second books covers Caucasus and some annexed by Russian countries a.k.a. Soviet Republics. It is clear they were pushing him to the glorious sides, but it is obvious he knew it was BS and took satire images instead of glorious.

 

[Archlich]

"A western sightseer's view" on Part 2 pp. 86 sums it up well IMO.

Of course you only see a small crop of local reality, as with any tourist.

 

[maigo]

He was first, somewhat allowed to take pictures in Stalin Soviet. I can't recall someone else to do it before him in this style. He wasn't alone, nor was he free to photograph. He took photo of waiting line to the store without permission while in the car with his watchers.

I don't think I was able to get this book. I have his second trip book. And it is full of satire and ezop language. His feel was very close feel as some of us had. Absurd, lies and laugh via anecdotes.

Ezop = Aesop?

 

[Joao]

He was first, somewhat allowed to take pictures in Stalin Soviet. I can't recall someone else to do it before him in this style...

Maybe not in HCB style, but in 1948, when Stalin was still alive, John Steinbeck and Robert Capa, were invited to visit the Soviet Union. They report their visit in "A Russian Journal", a quite interesting work. Robert Capa took more than 3000 photos and he was forced to let them be developed before they left the country. The developed negatives were returned to R Capa in a sealed package to be opened only after they left to Prague. Not all the negatives were returned to him, some were missing.
Many of the published photos are excellent.
Regards
Joao

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Thank you, I have it ordered.

 

[jmanivelle]

Maybe not in HCB style, but in 1948, when Stalin was still alive, John Steinbeck and Robert Capa, were invited to visit the Soviet Union. They report their visit in "A Russian Journal", a quite interesting work. Robert Capa took more than 3000 photos and he was forced to let them be developed before they left the country. The developed negatives were returned to R Capa in a sealed package to be opened only after they left to Prague. Not all the negatives were returned to him, some were missing.
Many of the published photos are excellent.
Regards
Joao

Just read the book "A Russian Journal" by Steinbeck and Capa .
They were not invited. Their demand to visit the Soviet Union as artists was accepted . They could travel within the SU way more than journalists could at the time.
A great book indeed.

Best, JM.