Photography & The Real Heroes

by Samar S Jodha

To me, photography practice is like a pyramid—nothing to do with what is more or less creative. So the way it goes, the most significant amount of professionals are passport, school-student photographers, above sits weddings, then comes travel ones, on top sits commercial & advertising, followed by a lesser number of professionals in the field of personal, documentary and artistic narrators. And above all sits photojournalism, who I have tremendous respect for, But what I think is at the pinnacle of this pyramid are the professionals who work in conflict zones. What we call the “war photographers.” They are the brave ones; they risk their lives, knowing very well that a bullet or a bomb blast is waiting for them. Also, let’s not forget, they are photographers and not combat trained for any of these situations. And to get that image, they are in line of fire between the two warring parties. They don’t do pictures that can be rescued/ saved/ retouched in the comfort of a photoshop studio. They are driven by courage and grit in these dangerous situations. In our non combat world, documentaries and Hollywood movies are made on these fearless men & women.One such person was Danish Siddiqui (not a pal other than connected on social media). His work leads him into hotspots of conflicts across South Asia; the work on the Rohingya refuge crises even got him the Pulitzer.Unfortunately, yesterday he took that bullet, and we lost him in Afghanistan. But this man not only leaves precious work behind but will inspire generations of young photojournalists into the future of this profession.It’s beyond words for the vacuum he leaves behind for his wife and children, his friends, professional associates and countless people he inspired through his photographs Thank you, Danish for the courage you represent, the compassion you always carried and for telling us such powerful stories driven by your pure passion!

Our Salute!

RIP

#DanishSiddiqui#warphotographers#Afghanistan

Website: https://www.danishsiddiqui.net/

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danish_Siddiqui .