Hiroshima: The Lost Photographs

[K.C. Cool]

I was looking around design observer and found this contextual to NMA:

One rainy night eight years ago, in Watertown, Massachusetts, a man was taking his dog for a walk. On the curb, in front of a neighbor’s house, he spotted a pile of trash: old mattresses, cardboard boxes, a few broken lamps. Amidst the garbage he caught sight of a battered suitcase. He bent down, turned the case on its side and popped the clasps.


He was surprised to discover that the suitcase was full of black-and-white photographs. He was even more astonished by their subject matter: devastated buildings, twisted girders, broken bridges — snapshots from an annihilated city. He quickly closed the case and made his way back home.


At the kitchen table, he looked through the photographs again and confirmed what he had suspected. He was looking at something he had never seen before: the effects of the first use of the Atomic bomb. The man was looking at Hiroshima.


In a dispassionate and scientific style, the seven hundred and one photographs inside the suitcase catalogued a city seared by a new form of warfare. The origin and purpose of the photographs were a mystery to the man who found them that night. Now, over sixty years after the bombing of Hiroshima, their story can be told.

http://www.designobserver.com/archives/entry.html?id=38841#more

 

[Ah-Teen]

In a dispassionate and scientific style,

American photographers took a hell of a lot of pictures. Unfortunately they fit this quote well.

Though there are a lot of great photos on that page. It's probably good they came out now rather than earlier. Military has a tendency to destroy records they don't need anymore. That includes photographs.

 

[w3rn3r]

wow. thats sad and amazing at the same time. how so much devestation can be caused at once.

 

[K.C. Cool]

Now I could be wrong, but I think the 2nd to last photo (the one with the feet traced) was where some one became vaporized (or burnt to death). I didn't catch that on the first read.