Trapped Light

Who narrates history? The victors, the defeated, or the spectators? Bahman Jalali’s photograph is collected in the archive of Iran-Iraq War photographs to take us from the present moment to meet history. At first glance, the photograph, like a document of history carefully records the actual presence of military personnel, a cleric, trenches, tents, flags, weapons, sky, earth and brings them from the past into the present. This trapped light of the past immediately merges with the present time and tells a story hidden in the details. The photographer (taking a step back) frames the whole event and with a distancing look reveals both the front and behind the scene. The frame of the front scene shows a mass of soldiers preparing for shooting film while the behind-the-scenes frame spreads out into a field of separate and heterogeneous forces who are constructing a narrative of the war. Therefore the photograph before us is a moment of history that casts a ray on the disappearance of historical truth in historical photographs and on the other hand deconstructs the relationship between image and historiography.