Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin
Wednesday, 27 January 2010
Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin
Work from Afterlife.
“Afterlife is a re-reading of a controversial photograph taken in Iran on 6 August 1979. This remarkable image, taken just months after the revolution, records the execution of 11 blindfolded Kurdish prisoners by firing squad. The image, which captures the decisive moment the guns were fired, was immediately reproduced in newspapers and magazines across the world. The following year it was awarded a Pulitzer Prize and for the next 30 years its author was simply known as “Anonymous.” Only recently has the photographer’s identity been revealed as Jahangir Razmi, a commercial studio photographer working in the suburbs of Tehran.
The artists sought out and interviewed Razmi, and based on these discussions along with an examination of the 26 neglected images on the roll of film Razmi produced that day, they present a series of collages–an iconoclastic breakdown or dissection of the original image – that interrupts our relationship as spectators to images of distant suffering.” – Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin