Words Photography

Inspiration

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DECEMBER, 2013

SECONDByKEN KOBRÉ &JOHN HEWITT

How to recognise and perceive the actual truth in the flood of various images in the world of the 21st century ?

Between a documentary and

DEADLINEEVERY

A FICTIONAL IMAGE

The documentary “Deadline Every Second” takes you behind the scenes with photojournalists of the Associated PressKen Kobré

Briefing

Photograph by Jeff Chiu—AP

Deadline Every Second: On Assignment With 12 Associated Press Photojournalists, 56 minProducer: KEN KOBRÉ Co-producer: JOHN HEWITT

The AP sends 3,000 pictures ev-ery day. More than a million pictures a years. Over a billion people a day see Associated Press photographs on the pages of their newspapers, mag-azines, and in the relentless roll of Internet news coverage flashing on computer screens.The documentary “Deadline Every Second” takes you behind the scenes with photojournalists of the Associated Press, the world’s larg-est news picture agency. You will be on deadline with 12 top AP photog-raphers in the U.S. (from California wildfires to Wall Street), Europe (from 10 Downing St. to the Tour de France) and the Middle East (from

the West Bank and Gaza to Israel). You will be there as they capture still images ranging from sports and light features to danger and grief. They cover demonstrations in Greece and San Francisco, the earth-quake in Haiti, a US Marine patrol in Afghanistan, an assassination attempt in Pakistan. They share strategies for

approaching an assignment, wheth-er it’s the arrival of a wax figure of Obama for a museum, or a fiery clash in the West Bank. Be there at the cen-ter of the action with front-line shoot-ers who cover stories behind global headlines that range from comic fea-tures to international tragedy.“Deadline Every Second: On Assignment with 12 Associated Press Photojournalists” will change how you look at news images, especially if they bear the credit AP Photo.

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

ON THE COVER:Photograph byJeff Chiu —AP

ANALYSIS

Publisher:ARTKONTAKT

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6 | EditorialArtkontakt

BRIEFING8 | LightboxChris Carlson

11 | Miro PetekPhoto – Not Merely an Addition to the Text

BRIEFING27 | Mateja RekImages of the World “Beyond Us”

ARTKONTAKT37 | Creativity.Photography.Inspiration.What a Wonderful World

15 Searching for a Just Photographic and Cinematic Image

Andrej Šprah

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

For me, the most important thing in a photo is the story through which I acquaint people with what is happening and offer the reader and viewer a new side of understanding. But if you want to persuade people to care about what is in the photo, you have to make them look at the shot by way of aesthetics and the right moment. You arouse their interest in what is happening. The people I want to reach with my photo are perhaps those that do not read the newspaper and do not care about what goes on in the world. I want to make such people look at the photo and prevent them from not responding to it. I want them to realize that their ignorance is not justifiable. I want a photo that arouses the interest of people at a bus stop or in the street so that because of the drama in it they stop and buy a newspaper.— Ed Ou (photojournalist)

ESSAYSnov. 20 / 2012

Editorial

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

Searching for The Mirror How to subtly word the documentary, relentless photographic and filmic images shown in the excep-tional documentary on Associated Press photojo-urnalists? How to recognise and perceive the actual truth in the flood of various images in the world of the 21st century where, through the prism of competitvness and the spontaneous de-velopment of new ways of communication, dynamical technologies unstoppably transform our perception of the world? The answer also lies in our subjective respon-sibility towards rendering the truth, our personal commitment to an in-depth understanding of time and space. If we outline the arc from the introductory text “Photo – Not Merely an Addition to the Text” by a former journalist and a Member of the Slovenian Parliament Miro Petek, the current acting General Director of the Directorate for Media at the Ministry of Education, Science,

Culture and Sports of the Republic of Slovenia, to the essay “Searching for a Just Photographic and Cinematic Image” by Andrej Šprah, Head of the Research and Publishing Department of the Slovenian Cinematheque, we could say that objec-tivity in media reality is a myth, an ideal worthy of special attention. It

doubtlessly requires the individual moral commit-ment and a high degree of ethics of everyone who produces, uses and reflects images in small media environments as well as the broadest international media space.

Barbara Jakše JeršičARTKONTAKT

Briefing

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

Collecting photographs means collecting the world.

Guenther Cartwright, recounts how the question “Is photojournalism

dead?” or the slogan “Photojournalism is dead!” has found its way into news-paper headlines in practically every

decade.

“If there is a crisis in world photojournalism today, it is a crisis of editing and publishing, not of photography.” JOHN G. MORRIS

3.000Pictures AP sends every day

12Top AP photographers in the U.S.

8Countries

1 Documentary Deadline Every Second

LightboxBriefing

Photograph by Chris Carlson—AP

Photograph by Julie Jacobson—AP

I was a journalist for a quarter of a cen-tury. Let me correct myself, I still am a journalist because a journalist always remains a journalist even when their professional path leads them some-where else. And I myself feel that way. Journalism is always with me even when I am on the other side. This distance, the experience from the other side, can be very useful, since it offers a different view of journalists and journalism.

I watched Deadline Every Second with great interest. Several times. It is an excellent film by excellent creators, which has to reach the expert and gen-eral public. The film pays homage to photojournalists and photojournalism. It shows the fascination of photojour-nalism and the journalistic profession in general. It indicates how much adren-alin this profession releases. It is true that not everybody feels this journalis-tic adrenalin equally; most do not even have it and remain at the level of jour-nalistic clerks. To be the first, to be edgy,

to be exclusive, to be watched, to be read, to be cited, to take the best pho-to, to write a good, resounding text, to investigate a story and overthrow the government, uncover large-scale corrup-tion, to intervene in the background, to make a report from a war zone be read, to be aired on the most important tele-vision stations, to receive awards. That

is the adrenalin of full-blooded jour-nalism, may the journalists admit it or not. To uncover what others are try-ing to hide, to take your camera where most do not dare to go. The best or the most resounding journalistic and photo-journalistic stories today come precise-ly from hot spots and dangerous areas. The World Press Photo award usually goes to a photojournalist who managed to capture a tragedy, violence, human or natural disaster, cruelty of war, human drama or death.

The film necessari-ly opens many general questions regarding the journalistic profession and its ethics.Miro Petek

Briefing

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

The media world is also global and the film necessarily opens many gener-al questions regarding the journalistic profession and its ethics, as well as the question regarding our place in this, the place of Slovenia and Slovenian journal-ism. In the Slovenian press, photojour-nalists do not carry enough weight and do not get enough attention, although we do have a few excellent photojour-nalists. Editors do not consider photos

as elements that are equal to, sometimes even more important than the text. All too often, photos serve merely as an ad-dition to the text, as its illustration, editors equip it with their “linguistic message”. It has become standard prac-tice in Slovenia, for photojournalists’ shots to be concentrated on a few pages, just to get the taste of them, while the role of a photographer is all too often as-sumed by the journalists themselves. It is a known fact that you cannot write and take photos at the same time. But above all, you cannot simultaneously do both very well, which is why the di-chotomy between a photographer and a journalist is necessary. It is quite awk-ward when a journalist first interviews

someone and then grabs a camera, usu-ally of low quality, and starts taking photos. It is unpleasant for the journal-ist, but even more so for the interviewee who gets the feeling that their not wor-thy of a professional photo. In Slovenian media space, savings are made on photo-journalists and consequently good pho-tos, which is why photos are the inferior part of the Slovenian press. When me-dia owners and editors take a look at the reasons for the drastic decrease in print media circulation in recent years, they will have to examine their own re-sponsibility and not only point to the new media and difficult economic con-ditions. They will have to ask them-selves whether they have used the entire range of media creativity and attrac-tion that a good photo offers. If nine photo editors at The New York Times go through fifteen thousand photos a day and, in the end, select around a hun-dred of them, then it is evident what significance mainstream media ascribe to newspaper photos and also to those that create them. Thus, with their ap-proach to newspaper photos, big world newspapers and magazines are saying that photojournalism is not dead. Such media have their own audiences, which are more demanding, more educat-ed, which do not accept instant media production and offer and want some-thing more than internet pollution and

‘PHOTO – NOT MERELY AN ADDITION TO THE TEXT.’―MIRO PETEK

Briefing

over-communication. Just like objectivity is a myth in

journalism, an ideal that can never be reached, so, too, we cannot speak of objectivity in a newspaper photo, al-though it does freeze the moment in time. Leafing through Slovenian news-papers, we can immediately notice that some almost disdain or despise the re-portage form of a newspaper photo and use it primarily for interpretation or evaluation. This is part of the context of today’s media landscape in Slovenia, where the borders between journalistic genres have disappeared or, rather, jour-nalistic genres are ignored, reports are commented and interpreted and even an ordinary piece of news is becoming a commentary.

MIRO PETEK, who graduated in jour-nalism from the Faculty of Social Sciences in Ljubljana, worked as a journalist for the daily Večer and contributed to many other Slovenian newspapers for more than two decades. He received the main two Slovenian journalis-tic awards for his investigative journalism (Consortium Veritatis and Jurčič Award) and the Croatian journalistic award Goose Feather. He was acquainted with Western journal-ism during an educational course at the The Guardian in London. Because of his journalis-tic uncovering of the sidetracks of Slovenian transition, there was an attempt on his life in 2001. The contractor and attackers remained unpunished. He served as a member of the National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia for two terms. Currently, he is the acting General Director of the Directorate for Media at the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports. He is the author of three books: Upanje v Dolini smrti (2008), V Sovinem gnez-du (2010) and Hvala za besedo (2011).

Photograph by Lefteris Pitarakis—AP

Photograph by Khalil Hamra—AP

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

ANALYSIS

Visual Storytelling

Deadline Every Second (USA, 2011, here-inafter Deadline) is a documentary con-ceived and co-signed by cinematographer and producer Ken Kobré and co-produc-

er and editor John Hewitt, which at the heart of its thematic commitment fore-grounds the question of contemporary photojournalism. Specifically: in its fun-damental conceptions, the film confronts

us with the work process in which photo-journalists create images that convey the truth of events in the world every day, ev-ery hour, practically every second. The pho-tojournalists that the film follows on their assignments are the renowned names of the leading Associated Press (hereinafter AP) photographers: Oded Balilty, Chris Carlson, Jeff Chiu, Richard Drew, Khalil Hamra, Julie Jacobsen, Mark Lennihan, Bebeto Matthews, Lefteris Pitarakis, Laurent Rebours, Marcio Jose Sanchez and Tara Todras-Whitehill. The fields of inter-est they work in range from “covering” the everyday of political figures, sports spec-tacles, religious ceremonies and the struc-tures of monetary institutions to the hot spots of humanitarian disasters, armed con-flicts, political demonstrations and terror-ist attacks. At the same time, the film gives us an insight into the workings and editorial decision-making of the agency that the por-trayed photojournalists work for.

The two filmmakers have in-depth knowledge of the topics and (mass)me-dia activities that the film explores and problematises. Ken Kobré has, among oth-er things, made the documentaries Inside Sports Illustrated (2006) and Shooting Stars: Assignment Cannes Film Festival (2002), while John Hewitt is a documen-tary filmmaker, who signed Smokestack Lightnin’: The Life of Howlin’ Wolf (2005) and worked as a director, co-produc-er, scriptwriter and editor on Landmines

The main tendency of the film – showing the re-ality of photojournalistic work process.Andrej Šprah

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

ANALYSIS

of the Heart: Cambodia’s Struggle for Reconciliation (1999). In addition to their “practical” activities, we have to point out also the theoretical, journalistic and edu-cational aspect of their work: both are pro-fessors at San Francisco State University, where Kobré teaches photojournalism and Hewitt documentary production, while their bibliographies include a series of in-fluential texts. If we highlight only the most prominent works, then we cannot overpass Kobré’s Photojournalism: The Professionals’ Approach (Focal Press, 2008, which is already the sixth edition of this book) and his recently published Videojournalism: Multimedia Storytelling (2012), or Hewitt’s Documentary Filmmaking: A Contemporary Field Guide (Oxford University Press, 2009 – co-authored with documentarian Gustav Vazquez).

With its informative depth, the main tendency of the film – showing the re-ality of photojournalistic work process and following the “path” of a press pho-to from its creation to publication – opens a series of exciting questions faced by two “endangered” forms of contemporary visu-

al and audiovisual production: photojour-nalism and documentary film. We have used quotation marks for the expression “endangered” because we believe there to be a paradox in the prophecies (or even re-alisations) that again and again predict (or detect) the exhaustion, crisis or obsolete-ness if not the end or death of the present

‘JOHN CORNER IS CONVINCED THAT DOCUMENTARY VISIONS ARE MOVING DECISIVELY TOWARDS LIGHTER TOPICS.’

forms of image creation, due to technologi-cal, social, cultural, economic or political rea-sons. But the opposite perspective based on the findings of authors who argue that every (audio)visual creation is “incom-plete” and “unfinished” – from André Bazin and Roland Barthes on the side of theo-reticians, to Santiago Álvarez and Abbas Kiarostami on the side of the filmmakers

(if we focus only on cinema) – proves the inadequacy of such “realisations”. The be-liefs of the opponents of the finality theses can thus be encapsulated in the presuppo-sition that every new technological break-through generates a situation in which the visual approach begins to question itself in accordance with the new operating condi-tions, consequently revitalising and thereby

Photograph by Diaz Elian—AP

ANALYSIS

who with his theorem of post-documen-tary culture declared the end of the estab-lished conception of documentariness at the turn of the millennium. Corner is convinced that documentary visions are moving de-cisively towards lighter topics of “popular factual entertainment”, whereby the em-phasis on their “classical” norms – according to which they are supposed to function as a ”project of democratic civil rights“, as “jour-nalistic investigation and interpretation“, as “radical research and exposition of alter-native perspectives” – has fatefully shifted towards adapting to the demands of “enter-tainment”. This is supposed to have a crucial influence on the degradation of the status of a specific “documentary authority”, the relativisation of the role of “social actors” and the “epistemological and emotional par-ticipation” of the audience. The final conse-quence of such changes is supposed to lead to the exhaustion of the current or tradi-tional documentary paradigm, which is ba-sically supposed to represent something that belongs to the “project of political and cultural modernism”. It is needless to say

practically “reinventing” itself. Such pro-cesses, of course, do not take place in a social vacuum, but always leave a deep mark in the sociocultural and also politico-economic relations or even influence changes.

In the present context, every crucial, “major event” exploited by the media has spurred heated discussions on the decline, exhaustion or less privileged position of photojournalism in comparison to the new technologies and media. Thus, for exam-ple, Guenther Cartwright, recounts how the question “Is photojournalism dead?” or the slogan “Photojournalism is dead!” has found its way into newspaper headlines in practically every decade; that is, every time a new form of information technolo-gy boomed: television, cable programmes, world wide web, etc. But not even the most direct “live” visual reporting ever defini-tively endangered photographic images, al-though it definitely forced the print and (later) online media systems to rethink and consolidate themselves. At the level of cin-ematic documentariness, perhaps the most pressing is the intervention of John Corner,

Photograph by Tara Todras-Whitehill—AP Photograph by Khalil Hamra—AP

that practical experience again and again disproves such prophesies, superiorly illus-trated in the context of photography by the doyen of photojournalism, John G. Morris, in his 1998 autobiography Get the Picture: “If there is a crisis in world photojournalism today, it is a crisis of editing and publishing, not of photography.”

Kobré and Hewitt do not problema-tise the mentioned questions directly; it is the selection of creative approaches itself that points to them in the “background”. The inaugural moment of the film, which

premiered at Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington, DC) and is also available online, already foregrounds the equally

pressing “existential” question of a docu-mentary as a cinema or television format, as internet content or artistic “artefact”, whose autochthonous “exhibition” venue lies in galleries and museums of modern art. This exceedingly important dilemma of visual art forms and their uses is particularly rel-evant today – in a situation tossed by the constant bursts of “technological storms”, which in the audiovisual field can scarce-ly be adequately followed. It is precisely the last decade that has been witness to in-tense processes in which the area of show-ing and consuming moving images has been shifting from the established media envi-ronment to the practically unlimited virtu-al reality of the World Wide Web, on the one hand, and the “consecrated” spaces ded-icated to “contemporary art”, on the other. Consequently, this leads to new reflections on the fundamental principles of moving images, where the cinematic aspect is on-ly one form of the continuation of film by “other means” and where the possibility of being in the “film world” without actually having to go to the “cinema” is of essential

‘IT’S THROUGH THEIR PICTURES THAT READERS AND VIEWERS CAN SEE – AND TRULY UNDERSTAND – WHAT’S HAPPENING IN THE WORLD AROUND US.’―KEN KOBRÉ

Photograph by Khalil Hamra—AP Photograph by Richard Drew—AP

ANALYSIS

“feedback” that the image that has already been “exploited” by the media establishes in the process of its making. For a better un-derstanding, we will first analyse the film’s structure: at the basic level, it is composed of five episodes (ranging from “news”, “hu-manitarian disasters”, “sports spectacles”, “pilgrimage rituals” to “struggles and con-flicts”), in addition to the prologue and ep-ilogue. Within the episodes, we encounter

importance. Not only new technologies and digitalisation, but also the “artefactisation” of film, which, by entering the area of art galleries and museums, has finally received the status of an art object/event, bespeak the far-reaching nature of the mentioned beliefs that film will yet have to be invent-ed. It is precisely this scope of self-reflection and reinvention that Deadline belongs to with its thematic, formal and methodologi-

cal emphases.We want to point out three tenden-

cies that Deadline advocates: the tendency to cinematically capture the decisive mo-ment of the transformation of profilmic events into a photographic image ; the ten-dency to convey a story that affirms the ac-tuality and the moment of the creation of a photo already taken; the tendency to ar-gue the construction of meaning of the featured photo. As the additional, fourth aspect, let us point out the question of the

‘FOR ME, THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN A PHOTO IS THE STORY THROUGH WHICH I ACQUAINT PEOPLE WITH WHAT IS HAPPENING AND OFFER THE READER AND VIEWER A NEW SIDE OF UNDERSTANDING.’―ED OU

eighteen “assignments” of twelve photo-journalists in eight countries of the world. Their assignments are either contempora-neous, so that the filmmaker’s camera is at the scene of the photographing, or past and we watch a sort of a “photoreportage” in which the photographers explain the story of how the images that have already played their role in the media were made. In rare “interjections”, we see the interventions of

AP editors, who explain some of the main points of their photographers’ work. If on the basis of the above outline we “dissect” the film according to its individual chapters, i.e., episodes, which cover particular photo-journalistic assignments, then our structur-al scheme would look sort of like this:

The first tendency – the one of cap-turing the moment and the specifici-ty of a photo being taken – marks the

Photograph by Tara Todras-Whitehill—AP

prologue (Tara Todras-Whitehill report-ing on the Palestinian demonstrations in Ramallah) and the majority of “assign-ments” in the film: Pitarakis’s waiting for the British Prime Minister to leave his resi-dency; Drew’s coverage of the happening at the New York Stock Exchange; Sanchez’s search for the most adamant opponents of the ban on same-sex marriages in front of the San Francisco court; Pitarakis’s

‘THERE IS THIS MOTTO THAT SAYS THAT AS AN INDEPENDENT JOURNALIST YOU SHOULDN’T ACT, YOU SHOULDN’T GET INVOLVED, YOU ARE A FLY ON THE WALL.’―LEFTERIS PITARAKIS

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

ANALYSIS

coverage of the demonstrations outside the Iranian embassy in London; Carlson’s breaking through to the heart of the fires in California; Rebour’s racing with cyclists at the Tour de France; Julie Jacobsen’s search for the most dramatic moments of an NBA game; Chiu’s coverage of President Obama’s wax doll on its way to the San Francisco Wax Museum; Lennihan’s fas-cination over the field of solar cells on the roof of the Rockefeller Center; Matthews’s portrayal of an interviewee on a TV show; Hamra’s re-experience of the carefree mo-ments of youngsters on a beach in blocked Gaza; Todras-Whitehill’s attempts at a re-al perspective of capturing the Catholic Easter pilgrimage in Jerusalem and its con-tinuation in the “Holy Fire” ceremony of Ethiopian Christians; Balilty’s prediction of the reaction of Israeli police in its conflict with Palestinian demonstrators; and Tara Todras-Whitehill’s participation in the fu-neral of a killed Palestinian civilian.

The second tendency – the of explain-ing the conception of the photos, with-out the presence of the film camera – can be seen in Drew’s description of how the photos of “people falling into the abyss of death” from the burning WCT tower and the collapse of the “twins” on 9/11 were made; in Pitarakis’s memory of a Kurd pro-tester’s self-immolation and his explanation of how he photographed a suicide attack on Benazir Buto (and was himself wounded in the process); in Jacobson’s description of

photographing the catastrophic aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti; in (her) account of patrolling with marines in Afghanistan; in Balilty’s analysis of how he took the pho-to of a protestor on the West Bank flying into the wall of a shielded police cordon; in Hamra’s description of the shocking con-sequences of an unexpected bombing of Gaza; and in Pitarakis’s intervention in the epilogue about the photographers breaking the “principle of non-interference” (which we focus on in more detail below).

The third tendency – the one of the determination of meaning – is present in practically all “explanations”. In them, the reporters not only disclose the circumstanc-es of the event or relate the “stories” of indi-vidual shots – after all, it is the photo itself that best tells its own story – but often pro-vide (either indirectly or quite openly) al-so their fundamental individual stance to their work and the world. In these empha-ses, two completely opposite viewpoints be-come crystallized: the attitude of as great an indifference as possible and the attitude of direct emotional involvement. The first is encapsulated in Balilty’s explanation: “I would never put my personal feelings into the picture. I put it all aside and concentrate only on the images and on the light to tell the story and to put as much information as I can put in the image – that’s how I work.” Or Drew’s remark that, while recording the events of 9/11, he simply switched to “au-topilot”. On the other hand, Julie Jacobsen

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

ANALYSIS

Gates, argued for its removal from the pub-lic eye. But the editorial decision for its pub-lication insisted that the photo showed the moment of a soldier’s death in “a very pub-lic war; the young man was fighting on be-half of the government” which is why it is of the utmost importance that “our viewers and audience see what was happening and see the very real cause of the war, and this young marine’s ultimate sacrifice”.Rancièr’s reflection, whose fundamental tendency aims at the pressing issue of the possibility or the right to show unbearable, intolerable, unimaginable or unacceptable images (es-pecially images of atrocities that people are capable of inflicting upon each other), thus – also in the present constellation – radi-calises some of the essential problems that Kobré and Hewitt confront us with. At the core of the problematic, there thus remains unresolved (and perhaps irresolvable) the highlighted ambiguity that journalists en-counter in the filed practically every day.

Their actions are always conditioned by their individual commitment, which is, in turn, subject to the fundamental integri-ty of their perception of the world. Despite

‘IN DIRECT CINEMA, IF YOU LIKE, THE FILMED EVENT DOES NOT PRE-EXIST THE FILM OR THE SHOOT, BUT IS PRODUCED BY THEM. ’―JEAN-LOUIS COMOLLI

talks about emotional involvement, stress-ing that a photojournalist’s personal emo-tional reaction is always channelled into the photos. Sanchez and Hamra’s testimo-nies also bespeak this; when describing the event of taking a photo, they cannot (or will not?) hide the tears in their eyes, which de-spite seeing the innumerable chilling scenes of life are still capable of crying.The last ten-dency – the one of reflecting the feedback between the photographed traumatic event

and the reaction the photo has already evoked in public – can be seen especially in the photo of the mortally wounded Lance Corporal Joshua Bernard in Afghanistan; in Balilty’s image of the protestor in front of a police human shield (which won the Pulitzer Award); and in Pitarakis’s epilogue sequence on reporters interfering in the happening. The first image provoked an ex-traordinary response in the US, since even the Secretary of Defense at the time, Robert

a certain “subjection” to the media system, their work does not serve as a mere addition to the written news, it is not an illustration, a link in the narrative chain, but is always a sovereign, autonomous story of an individu-al experience. This is why it is of the utmost importance for the photographer to assume the right stand, in order to capture the bind-ing Benjaminian “spark of contingency“ of the here and now with which reality has seared the nature of the image, enabling it to enter the cycle of history. This is also what, in the exchange of images, views and thoughts, can/does lead to a reaction – in-dividual responsibility of each person that creates, uses, accepts and reflects them: re-sponsibility in the world and to the world.

ANDREJ ŠPRAH, PhD (Media Studies), is a film theoretician, writer and author of numerous essays and discussion in which he explores the phenomena of contemporary documentarism and socially engaged cinema. His monographs include the study “Utrujen od podobe svojega pogleda” in Pogib in počas (1997), reference monograph Dokumentarni film in oblast (1998), a collection of es-says on post-independence Slovenian films Osvobajanje pogleda (2004), a book on con-temporary documentary film Prizorišče odpora (2010) and the discussion Vračanje re-alnosti (2011), which examines the questions of new realism in world cinema. His contribu-tions are published mostly in KINO!, Ekran, Kinotečnik and Časopis za kritiko znanosti.

Photograph by Tara Todras-Whitehill—AP

Photograph by Lefteris Pitarakis—AP

Understanding Reality

Images of the world “beyond us”, a world that is not part of our immediate perception, have become an integral part of our lives. They are selected for and served to us by the mass media. They are provided every day and acces-sible practically incessantly, with their topi-cality, urgency and newness being of crucial importance. The photos and footage offered to the viewer or reader as part of a journalis-tic story in describing a certain event impor-tantly condition the perception of this event, its informative value and interpretation, be it a sports or a cultural event in one’s envi-ronment or a conflict in a maelstrom of war somewhere at the other end of the world. Together with the words that describe them, these images form the basis for understand-ing reality, the world around us, and in the long term function as the organising prin-ciple of our collective memory. We can even say that we live in a “mediated” society since many of our ideas, knowledge and, proba-bly most importantly, values do not proceed merely from our everyday, direct experiences. Our understanding of the world is to a signif-icant extent shaped by contemporary me-dia that offer a “packaged” version of events and topics, which we consume as part of our

everyday. We can consume them at home, in the comfort of our living-room sofa or in a safe and warm office in front of a high-tech computer screen. But rarely do we think about the path that the photos and the foot-age make from the actual event (be it battles in the turbulent and dangerous Afghanistan, conflicts in Palestine or a basketball game in New York) to our or the viewer’s reflection

or knowledge on this event. Deadline Every Second foregrounds precisely the creators of such images – photographers and journal-ists – who with their presence at the scene of these events in their unique way repre-sent the “eyes” of the media audience. Their choice of the person, event, gesture, expres-sion, emotion, etc., that they devote attention to (and thereby leave out the others) in the given circumstances importantly determines what the viewer or reader of a mass medi-um finds out and how this event and thereby the reality of the current time is interpreted. Photographers and journalists thus play an

Together with the words that describe them, these images form the basis for understanding reality.Mateja Rek

Briefing

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

homage to the creators of media images. At the same time, it reminds us of the meaning of responsibility and ethics in jour-nalistic work, which remain significant challenges of journalism regardless of the cir-cumstances, which can range from the logic of capital and the pressures of political elites to the dimension of time, as Deadline Every Second nicely illustrates. What is important is the presence, to be at the right place at the right time, not prematurely and not too late.

‘THE JOURNALISTS CHOOSE, SELECT, FORM AND PASS ON INFORMATION AND OPINIONS ON CURRENT EVENTS/PHENOMENA VIA MASS MEDIA.’―MATEJA REK

Briefing

important and responsible role in the con-temporary world and with their work cre-ate the weltanshaung of millions of people all over the world. With globalisation, their reach has be-come even wider and, at least potentially, they can have an influence on the formation of global awareness and perhaps even col-lective memory, although, despite globalisa-tion, local social circumstances and cultures still play an exceptionally important role in

interpreting reality. Despite the fascinating nature of the journalistic profession and the fact that the stories about the reporters in the field can have much media appeal, the jour-nalists themselves are rarely at the centre of media reports. The general public most often knows their work, the results, the stories of “others for others”, which they disseminate, while they find out very little about them and the work that led to these stories. This is why the pro-duction and popularisation of films such as Deadline Every Second is an important con-tribution to raising the public’s “literacy” about media reality and represents a sort of

It is important to immediately and quick-ly disseminate and “serve” the acquired im-ages and information to the reader. But we must be aware that, with their presence, the journalists can also determine the impor-tance of a certain event since their absence can mean that without the media coverage the event will remain unknown and therefore insignificant. The journalists choose, select, form and pass on information and opinions on current

events/phenomena via mass media. But we must not forget that no medium is capable of conveying the truth about reality. It is always an interpretation of reality, which depends on the editors’ concept of the mass medium, their instructions, the journal-ist’s perception and skill, all of it being part of the broader social context, whose zeitgeist gives the undertone and ascribes meaning to events about which the journalists tell us their stories either with words or images.

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

Photograph by Stane Jeršič—BAST

IF YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON, YOU MIGHT AS WELL NOT BE THERE ― SANTIAGO LYON—AP

Photograph by Barbara Jakše Jeršič—BAST

IMAGES “ BEYOND US ”― MATEJA REK

IMAGES “ BEYOND US ”― MATEJA REK

Photograph by Oded Balilty—AP

Results-Driven Creativity

Project is supported by:

REPUBLIC OF S LOVENIA MINISTRY OF CULTURE

Project is supported by:

REPUBLIC OF S LOVENIA MINISTRY OF CULTURE