Subscribe to Print Edition | Fri., May 02, 2008 Nisan 27, 5768 | | Israel Time: 00:15 (EST+7) web haaretz.com   Back to Homepage Rosner's Domain Diplomacy Defense Jewish World Opinion National Print Edition Advertising Books Arts & Leisure Business Real Estate Easy Start Travel Week's End Anglo File

Worth 1,000 words By Alex Levac Tags: Pavel Wolberg, Photography Pavel Wolberg, exhibition catalog, Dvir Gallery, 100 pages, NIS 200 First image. Page 2. Title: Tufah Village, 2002. The scene depicted here is nearly impossible: a mother is having a light meal with her four children. The atmosphere is domestic, pastoral. The mother smiles, holding a knife, spreading honey on pita. On the right side of the photograph, an Israeli soldier wearing a helmet is walking into the room, holding his weapon with both hands. He is completely out of place - and indeed, no one in the room pays him any attention. Are they ignoring him out of defiance? Or has he been there a long time already, long enough to become a part of the household, and therefore of no interest anymore? Second image. Tufah Village, 2002. Page 16. Again, it shows soldiers in an apartment in the same village. A nice apartment, whitewashed, with wall-to-wall carpeting. They are in the living room, judging by the mattresses and pillows lining the walls. The soldiers are standing with their backs to the photographer. The one farthest away steps on a mattress, pushing the clean pillows aside with his foot, looking for something. Advertisement Third image. Tufah Village, 2002. Page 21. A dramatic scene. Two soldiers are standing in a dark place. It's nighttime. One of the soldiers aims his weapon at something inside a room. To his right are nine family members, huddled together. One of the girls presses her palms together, as though she is begging the soldiers. Scary. In her essay entitled "In, Around, and Afterthoughts (On Documentary Photography)," American photographer and critic Martha Rosler writes that documentary photography "testifies... to the bravery or (dare we name it?) the manipulativeness and savvy of the photographer, who entered a situation of physical danger, social restrictedness, human decay, or combinations of these and saved us the trouble." But did the photographer really save us the trouble of being present at the event, even if he was there in our stead? As a photographer myself, I know that every event - even the simplest and least complex - will be captured in different ways by different photographers. If so, which photographer's view has saved us the trouble of being there? Rosler is aware of this problem, and she asks about the extent to which photography really is documentation: Is it what we actually see, or a metaphor? Representation or allegory? When I look at Pavel Wolberg's "Tufah Village" series of photographs, all of which were presumably taken on the same day, I realize that he is the witness I would like to be there in my place. This is the kind of photography that makes me consider and empathize with both families in the picture: the mother sticking to her domestic routine and even smiling, despite the invading, armed soldier; and the frightened, huddled family, the begging girl. But it also arouses a different kind of empathy - for the soldier who stands in the doorway, for the soldier who aims his weapon at the unknown, experiencing this absurd situation an hour's drive away from the cafes of Tel Aviv. I am tired of the flat, cliched photographs of the so-called aesthetics of the conflict: burning tires, funerals and so on. I want the photographer to enter the houses and observe the soldiers and the residents interlocked in the endless embrace of the occupation. These photographs show the unbearable, everyday routine, the mutual humiliation, the struggle in which everyone is a loser. The photos from Tufah contain several rare insights. The army hardly ever allows photographers such an intimate look at unfolding events. The situations are extremely absurd, surreal. Surrealism, absurdity and humor are a permanent feature in Wolberg's photographs, and his use of natural light (instead of a flash) adds an element of darkness, of shadows, of depression. Did we leave the events behind us when we turned the page? I think that in this case, the hallucinatory reality continues to haunt us. The photos in the catalog from the recent exhibition by Wolberg work on two levels. On the one hand, there is the simple, clear message of the news photographer, the craftsman, the professional; he takes the pictures he is sent to take. At a second glance, however, many of Wolberg's photographs go beyond the threshold of the professional who "always gets the frame." Let us look at another image from the margins of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on page 22. The caption below the photo laconically reads, "Jenin 2002." Lacking any more detail, I tell myself a story about the image. Some of it might be fiction, but that is the essence of a good photo: the fact that the observer projects onto it some of his own inner world. Before us unfolds the story of two Palestinians who are former security prisoners. They are walking home. In the background is an Israeli tank and the two men, their backs to us, are walking in the foreground. Both are carrying large bags, and both - one on his shoulder, in a plastic bag, and the other on his head, like a crown - carry miniatures models of the Dome of the Rock. Something they built (of matches, perhaps) during long years in prison. Something they will proudly display in their homes, both a souvenir and a symbol of the new hope that will now fill their lives: religion. Because there is no other outlet, especially now that the tank is headed for the village. The subtext is as important as the text itself. A honey trap The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the media's most intensely covered subject, not just in this country, but throughout the world. The pictures of the ongoing struggle take up a central place in the archive of any self-respecting photographer. Every once in a while, a photograph of the conflict wins a prestigious award. Last year Oded Balilty's wonderful photo of the evacuation of the Amona settler outpost won the Pulitzer Prize. Since the conflict is so accessible, spread out over a relatively small geographical area and still mostly "human" (that is, taking place between people and not between missiles, satellites and computers), photographers are drawn to it like flies to a honey trap. The conflict "photographs well": stone-throwers, masked militants, terrorist attacks, funerals, blood and fire and smoke. And if all this were not enough, there are some surrealistic embellishments, such as medieval walls, tall sentry towers, barbed wire, metal detectors and more. What else could a photographer ask for? That is why media consumers around the world are flooded with fine, touching photographs of our troubles, but it is also precisely why the heart becomes satiated and coarsened. Only rarely does the eye linger on any one photograph. Until a few years ago, Wolberg, who works today for the European Pressphoto Agency (EPA), was a photographer for Haaretz. In a conversation with Moshe Ninio, held during a 2002 exhibition of Wolberg's photographs at the Tel Aviv Museum, Wolberg said: "If I took pictures only for the paper, I would take very few pictures. The needs of the paper are not great when it comes to photography." The newspaper, he claimed, wanted only the most boring picture with which to bolster the text somehow; it had no interest in displaying the photo for its own sake. But Wolberg got a bit carried away. All you have to do is look at his wonderful photographs to realize that there is still interest in journalistic photography. True, at EPA, photos are observed and treated in a far deeper, more satisfying manner than at Israeli newspapers. But a photographer who stands before a wonderful frame does not ask himself whom he is working for. At that moment, the photograph is forced on him. In the same conversation with Ninio, Wolberg spoke of one of the other photographs in the book (page 35): Qalqilyah, 2002. "I sat there, next to the checkpoint, and I experimented with the focus. I focused on her face. There was light on her. There were all kinds of things there, but somehow she was the one who entered my frame. Here is the woman's head, the light, her neck, her whole shape, her face interested me." Wolberg describes a situation that every photographer knows: We play. Photography is a game, of light, color, focus, composition, content. I know that the moment I stop playing, I will also stop taking pictures. Of all the news photographers working here today, Wolberg is one of the few who manages to walk the tightrope between "work" photographs and "artistic" ones - that is, photographs that become "currency," and are displayed in galleries and museums, and bought by collectors. This book was put out in English by the Dvir Gallery as a promotional catalog for an exhibition that ended last month. It has no theme. It resembles a kind of retrospective. But since Wolberg is young and has worked as a news photographer for only about a decade, it is too soon to be summing up his work. Even he says that had it been up to him, he would not have chosen some of the photos included in this collection. There is no doubt that Wolberg is a wonderful photographer with a rare and unique vision that captivates the observer. I like to read several authors. But photographers tell stories, too: I like to read Pavel Wolberg. Bookmark to del.icio.us   Hamas on the Holocaust Al-Aqsa TV claims Jews concocted the Holocaust. Grasping genocide How a non-Jew in Israel came to understand the Holocaust.

Read & React IDF chief: We take calls for Israel's destruction seriously Responses: 142 Israel Harel: Jewish guilt over Gaza deaths weakens us in fight for Israel's existence Responses: 151 Hamas TV: 'Satanic Jews' planned, perpetrated Holocaust Responses: 124 Palestinians: IDF kills 62-year-old Gazan; 9 Qassams hit Negev Responses: 65 Mofaz, at Yale: Iran could have nuke bomb technology this year Responses: 31 More Headlines 22:21 Police summon PM for urgent questioning under caution 20:24 IDF chief at Auschwitz: We take calls for Israel's destruction seriously 17:34 Hamas TV claims 'Satanic Jews' planned, perpetrated Holocaust 22:56 Yellow patch, Blue victory: U.K. media praise Grant after Chelsea win 21:12 Ma'aleh Adumim mayor: I got impression that gov't plans to divide J'lem 23:33 Leftist group: Police barring us from monitoring Hebron settlers 12:03 Son gets Dad's Auschwitz tattoo on own arm 20:07 Top U.S. official: America would look favorably on PA request for additional funding 16:36 South Africa withdraws request to host 'Durban 2' conference 16:27 Palestinians: IDF kills 62-year-old Gazan; 9 Qassams hit Negev 17:53 Condoleezza Rice returns to the Mideast on Saturday 19:23 Two children and one senior citizen die in separate car accidents 21:58 Erekat: Abbas 'doing very, very well' after heart procedure Previous Editions Select Day 01 may 30 apr 29 apr 28 apr 27 apr 25 apr 24 apr 23 apr 22 apr 21 apr 20 apr 18 apr

Special Offers Advertisement Pardes Institute Summer Sessions http://www.pardes.org.il/ FAREWELL ISRAEL New Film The Coming War for Islamic Revival - View Movie Trailer The interest rates haven't changed But your profits will! Learn Hebrew online with Israel's best teachers Sign up for a trial lesson today Free the Palestinians from: Corrupt Kleptocracy, Tyrannical Theocracy, Abysmal Anarchy Fattal Hotel Chain Perfectly located hotels on best resorts of Israel. ISRAEL BONDS Build Israel Israel bonds - a multi-purpose way to celebrate Israel's 60th Eldan Rent a Car Israel's leading car rental company offers you a 20% discount on all online reservations Junkyard Junk a car - get free towing nationwide and a tax-deductible receipt

Home | TV | Print Edition | Diplomacy | Opinion | Arts & Leisure | Sports | Jewish World | Underground | Site rules |

Real Estate in Israel

Haaretz.com, the online edition of Haaretz Newspaper in Israel, offers real-time breaking news, opinions and analysis from Israel and the Middle East. Haaretz.com provides extensive and in-depth coverage of Israel, the Jewish World and the Middle East, including defense, diplomacy, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the peace process, Israeli politics, Jerusalem affairs, international relations, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, the Israeli business world and Jewish life in Israel and the Diaspora.

© Copyright  Haaretz. All rights reserved