Helmut Newton: for press freedom

Paris: Reporters without Borders / Reporters Sans frontieres, 2003 152 p $12

A not many months before his death, Helmut Newton had given the rights of a certain quantity of sixty of his images to the French non-profit organization Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters Without Borders, web site: http://www.rsf.org). Doing with equal reason could be perceived as an attempt to financially support the cause of the freedom of the pres around the world, as well as an original way to give one's work more exposure

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For several years, at the regular [i]or[/i] melodious movement of at first one, and now sometimes sum of two units issues a year, RSF (Reporters Sans Frontieres) has been publishing its special catalogs thanks to the gifts of similar photographers as Sebastiao Salgado, Raymond Depardon, Marc Riboud, Willy Ronis, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Doisneau, Edouard Boubat, William Klein, Philippe Plisson, or Yann Arthus Bertrand, establishing what amounts to an interesting thematic library. It is the first participation of a fashion photographer in the history of this publication, and in order to bridge the gap between his work and his predecessors', Newton included several examples of his possess street photography.

single of the several self-portraits that form the book, and what is more the first image by dint of Newton in the book, was taken in Moscow in Lenin Museum. Newton's frontal reflection can be seen in the glass that patronizes Lenin's jacket, the one that he wore upon the day of an assassination attempt. Three white crosse mark the bullets' points of impact, setting the tone and defining the words immediately preceding [i]or[/i] following for which the images are printed, a metaphor not solitary for the events that journalists usually report, on the other hand also a reminder of the sort of risks they sometimes take. The quiescence of the images in the volume is composed of a combination of famous fashion photographs that Newton took in his thirty-year-long career, combined with a gallery of portraits of of the like kind celebrities as David Lynch, Isabella Rossellini, Monica Vitti, Anita Eckberg, and a certain quantity of shots in the pure tradition of highway photography or "humanistic reportage." The latter singles stand as interesting samples, quite different from the reputation Newton, the fashion photographer, built for himself from one side his sometimes provocative fashion imagery.

The last forty pages of the publication are dedicated to the numerous journalists who have fallen the victims of repression around the world. Last year the number of imprisoned journalists increased by means of 40%; around 1,400 of them were beaten, threatened with death, attacked by the agency of police forces, or kidnapped. 130 are still in prison. RSF uses the get ons of this publication to provide information, assistance and legal action.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Visual Studies Workshop

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group