An Agent for Change?
- Laura Marsh
- Mar 16, 2021
- 3 min read
The main area of interest that stood out to me this week was the events of 9/11. Like many of us, it was my first experience of anything as devastating on that scale being broadcast and shown around the world. I was at college on the day, my second day of my course and I remember coming home to watch the news play out the morning’s events. It was shocking and devastating to see, and as it has been referred to it was like watching a scene from a film or TV programme, and you had to remind yourself that this was real.
In terms of censorship and being desensitised, that reaction and experience of watching this event play out could be linked to that of films, where we have become used to watching a ‘scene’ of a terror attack or natural disaster as entertainment, therefore the shock factor is reduced. Once you remember and realise this was happening, the reality hits, then it does become disturbing.
The images of the burning towers have always stayed with me and it is an image we revisit each year on the anniversary, along with those images of the jumpers. I refer to ‘The Falling Man’. Seeing this person captured in their final moments is shocking and is said to the only photograph of someone dying that day, as mentioned in ‘The Falling Man |Behind The Photo | 100 Photos by Time’, a short documentary in 2016 detailing how the image was captured. This image has essences of the ‘punctum’ (Barthes, 2000). That moment that hits you that this man is in this moment alive, but seconds later will be dead.
Are these images okay to be shown and published? Some may say no as they are too disturbing to look at. There is a sense of anonymity about the images not only of the falling man but of those other jumpers that were captured on the day. We cannot see their faces or expressions therefore this could take away that shock factor. Almost as if they are abstract objects silhouetted against the sky and building, that viewers may not realise what they are looking at, at first, then it becomes shocking when they do realise.
The Falling Man | Behind The Photo | 100 Photos | Time
I personally found the video footage more disturbing, as it brings the still images to life and you see these figures falling at speed, making it all too real as to what is happening and you are almost witnessing their death before your eyes, whereas in an image they are frozen between life and death.
The publication of images where everywhere, and I remember my dad giving me the newspaper he bought the next day, a copy of The Sun September 12th, 2001. The images were not graphic, but two were powerful, the front cover showing the burning towers and an image of many jumpers falling from on building. As a 16 year old at the time, this was shocking, but I was drawn to look at it anyway. Why my dad gave it to me to keep, I am not sure, but possibly as a memento of the day and event for historical purposes and I do have the paper to this day.
References:
Barthes, Roland, and Richard Howard. Camera Lucida : Reflections on Photography. London, Vintage Books, 2000, pp. 25–27.
Man. “The Falling Man | behind the Photo | 100 Photos | TIME.” YouTube, 8 Sept. 2016, youtu.be/SMDkvJRHaNM. Accessed 16 Mar. 2021.
Time 100 Photos. “How a Haunting 9/11 Photo of a Falling Man Gripped the Nation.” 100 Photographs | the Most Influential Images of All Time, TIME 100 Photos, 2001, 100photos.time.com/photos/richard-drew-falling-man. Accessed 16 Mar. 2021.
Images:
Drew, Richard. “The Falling Man, 2001,” Esquire, 9 Sept. 2016, www.esquire.com/news-politics/a48031/the-falling-man-tom-junod/. Accessed 16 Mar. 2021.
Figures:
Fig 1: Richard Drew, 2001, The Falling Man
Fig 2: Laura Marsh, 2021, The Sun Newspaper, Front Cover, 12th September, 2001
Fig 3: Laura Marsh, 2021, The Sun Newspaper, Article by Paul Thompson 12th September, 2001
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