The D Day Photos of Robert Capa

Re. Robert Capa and Normandy from about 21mins 30 seconds in...

BBC iPlayer - Age of the Image - Series 1: 2. Power Games
BBC Documentary - 60 mins.

James Fox explores how mass communication and new technology helped 20th-century image-makers transform society, as films, photographs, TV, art and advertising all became weapons in the ideological battles of the age.

James tells the story of Marlene Dietrich and Leni Riefenstahl, who each used cinema to pursue very different visions of power and freedom. We discover how Jewish comic book artists in New York created superheroes as their act of resistance to the Nazi threat. And we find out why a Muhammad Ali magazine cover is one of the most powerful political images of the last century.

In the UK he reveals how Picture Post photographers and directors such as Ken Loach empowered the lives of ordinary people through a new style of film-making and reportage. Travelling from the Normandy beaches where Robert Capa took his famous D-Day photographs to the Nasa control room that first witnessed live images from the moon landings, it’s an exhilarating look at how image-makers discovered the power to influence and change our lives.

 

Looking forward to the DVD. Local library system has a copy... But the libraries are shut down at the moment. Still, I'll see it eventually!

 

Thanks for the nod! Appreciate it.

I've been researching this topic for seven years now and believe I have a fairly good grip on the subject, though there are still many unknowns. I have been surprised how many bits of actual evidence I was able to dig up. I knew US Coast Guard cameraman Ruley was filming aboard LCI(L)-94, but was greatly surprised to find his film clips showing Capa. Neither man mentioned the other in their respective accounts. The major hurdle I've encountered is the that custodians of the Capa archives have denied me permission to view the original negatives, which has caused many problems. I did discover another Capa Omaha Beach D-Day photo in their internal digital database (to which I was given limited access) that has never been made public to the best of my knowledge. I suspect there are more, but without full access, we'll never know.

Capa's Slightly Out of Focus was an unabashed bit of tall tale telling, as the dust jacket of the original made clear. "Writing the truth being obviously so difficult, I have in the interest of it allowed myself to go sometimes slightly beyond and slightly this side of it. All events and persons in this book are accidental and have something to do with the truth." His biographer, and at one point custodian of his files, noted that disclaimer was necessary because Capa wrote the book not as a historical account, but for a movie screenplay.

Entire sections were fabrications, such as his parachute drop into Sicily. He flew only as a non-jumping photographer/observer on a post-D-Day reinforcing drop. He actually arrived in Sicily on an LST carrying the ground echelons of an air transport command unit. The magazine even published a photo spread of it. Unfortunately many people want to give his Omaha Beach tale total credibility, when it had nearly as many fabrications as the rest of his book. The story of how he dodged out of his assignments to parachute in for Normandy and Market Garden are kind of funny, as is how he finally ran out of excuses for Varsity.

The detail of the exhaust stacks for the DD tanks I must credit to Pieter Jutte, He is an expert in his own right and is an excellent source. He located the same landing site for Capa as I did, using a different methodology. Similarly, our analyses of the engineer photos came to many of the same conclusions.

My analysis of Capa's D-Day picture taking is more tightly focused on specific military aspects than is the case with the rest of Alan Coleman's project, as you can see from here:

Robert Capa on D-Day « Photocritic International

I've dug up more since those guest posts were published. Some day I'll finally call an end to the eternal research and try to publish the results. I figure there must be a market of at least 3, maybe 4, people who'd buy it.

Thanks again.

Chuck Herrick

 

Count me in!

The tall exhaust stacks on the US DD tanks were indeed a great fixture. Even standard height wadings stacks on the Commonwealth DD tanks (adapted to fit the DD gear) would have been a good idea too, as they would have prevented many tanks from drowning in the surf once they had lowered they skirts...

 

Cheers, Michel! Hope you're doing well.

As I recall, it was Pieter who first pointed out that only the 741st tank battalion had those stacks. I haven't seen anything to prove otherwise and I haven't seen any manuals that mention those devices. Not sure why it didn't see more widespread use. I'm guessing a very practical and hardheaded warrant officer in the battalion's maintenance shop came up with the idea and sold his commander on it.