Context / Invasion. Prague
Josef Koudelka. Photo: theasc.com
the very last order «Do not shoot!» opened fire. On the first
day of the invasion 58 people were killed.
It was impossible to take pictures in that chaos simply
because it was dangerous. And Josef Koudelka climbed
onto Soviet tanks and captured everything around. It was
there he was noticed by the photographer of the agency
«Magnum» Ian Berry who called him «an absolute maniac»
and then took his pictures from Czechoslovakia so they
were published.
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F.M. 1891 IN LINE / Photo project
The horror of the captured country, tank columns,
people trying to stop armored vehicles, a bus crushed by
the caterpillars of the tank — all these things were left on
August 21. The following morning Wenceslas Square was
cleaned, the bodies of the dead were removed and those
who stayed alive were dispersed. The area was empty.
On August 22 at 12.21 p. m., Josef Koudelka takes a picture
with a watch against the already cleaned Wenceslas Square,
completely empty and deserted.
Josef Koudelka was not the only photographer who
captures the invasion, however, unlike other photojournalists,
being local, he was not a spectator but a full participant in
those events. A year later, thanks to the recommendation
of the agency «Magnum», Koudelka was invited to Britain
as a photographer in the theatrical company, he obtained a
working visa for three months and left Czechoslovakia. Then
in 1970 he was granted political asylum in France.
Only in 1984, after the death of his father, when there
were be no relatives left in Czechoslovakia, he could admit
that he was the author of those pictures of the invasion that
were everywhere in 1968.
Read more: an interview with a photographer on the
Russian state news agency RIA Novosti website, an interview
with a photographer on the photographer.ru website, an
interview with a photographer on the website si-foto.com.
F.M. 1891 IN LINE
Photographer: Philip Rabachev
Model: Vladislav Klimenko
Makeup, hairstyle: Natal’ya Ustavitskaya
Style: Mariya Zasepskaya
Clothes: “Second kent”
Text by: Vladimir Vishnevskij
Photo by: Josef Koudelka «Invasion — Prague 1968»
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