People kill each other every day. We might not see it or know about it until it reaches the news and the truth of it hits our ears and maybe we will never hear about it but it still happens. That is what Eddie Adams most famous photograph, “The Saigon Execution”, is if nothing else. It is a man killing another during the Vietnam war. That is something that happens quite a bit in war so much so that some people very well may think of death and war as someone synonymous. It happens for a variety of reasons some moral and some not with each new death generally being just as equal to the last, or at least that is the idea. Now this particular photograph also received a Pulitzer that Adams didn’t want due to both the resulting events, primarily towards the shooter, and why the photograph was taken. Its message wasn’t meant to be anything more than a daily snapshot of the reality of war however the media attached an entirely different meaning which became the popular view. Adams himself was a photographer who started his career in high school but continued on to freelancing, several years work in the AP (Associated Press) as well as photographer for Parade magazine until his death.
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The background depicts a city view but instead of there people and other signs of life it is barren with only one sign of life in the background. It isn’t the type of view you would imagine to see walking through the streets of any town in the middle of the day however most of us don’t imagine such things in the terms of wartime.
Another aspect is the angle of the photograph. You can see the face of the man you died but you can only see a part of the face of the man who killed him. The shooter is standing with his back to the photographer; you can see that he is standing tense and assured although his expression as well as the insight that could be gathered from it alludes you. The man who died stands facing the photographer; you can see his expression quite clearly as he stands hands bound behind his back as he is shot. The pain is there although the reasons are
The background depicts a city view but instead of there people and other signs of life it is barren with only one sign of life in the background. It isn’t the type of view you would imagine to see walking through the streets of any town in the middle of the day however most of us don’t imagine such things in the terms of wartime.
Another aspect is the angle of the photograph. You can see the face of the man you died but you can only see a part of the face of the man who killed him. The shooter is standing with his back to the photographer; you can see that he is standing tense and assured although his expression as well as the insight that could be gathered from it alludes you. The man who died stands facing the photographer; you can see his expression quite clearly as he stands hands bound behind his back as he is shot. The pain is there although the reasons are