We know that images can hold history in place. We forget sometimes that they can also drive it forward. In 1992 Los Angeles exploded over the meaning of pictures of a black man being beaten by white police. And it was pictures -- of spectral women and withered children -- that launched the rescue mission in Somalia. It may have been awkward to have cameras meet the troops when they landed, but wasn't it also appropriate? In a sense it was cameras that had sent them there.
This was a year that disproved the truism that scenes of tragedy all blur...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
