War Photography

First off I would just to make a blanket remark that this picture by Yakov Khalip called Nocturne in the ruins is amazing. The image is framed on three sides by people and rocks. When the viewer first looks at the image they start on the left side (reading it like a book). There they find a young man that appears to be clapping. Next, their eye moves to a monolithic feature that appears to be what is left of a bombed building; this establishes the site of the photo, showing the viewer that the landscape is a war zone. As the viewer continues to sweep across the photo they will find a large group of armed men in the background all staring at one common point. Finally, the viewer looks at the left side of the image finding the main focus of the image which is a soldier in the fore-ground playing a fiddle.

The fiddler is very intriguing because it is not what one would except would be happening in a war zone. It is almost like the soldiers have transformed their surroundings into a concert hall and have forgotten where they are. Their focused expressions show that they are currently lost in the moment and are enjoying the escape of the music. The entire image is very well balanced; there is something on both the right and left side of the photograph. The image is high contrast; it is light near the top and dark near the bottom. This contrast could represent the darkness of the war contrasted by the lightness of the moment of the fiddler playing.