War is only Half the Story – 10 years of the Aftermath Project

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Director/Founder/sustaining editor; Sara Terry (resides in Los Angeles, CA, USA)

Photographers: various, all copyrights apply to the photographers

Publisher: Dewi Lewis Publishing (Manchester, UK)

Introduction: Sara Terry, essays by Donald Weber, Clare Cavanagh, poems by Wislawa Szymborska

Text: English

Stiff-cover book, Concertina cover with belly bands, sewn naked binding, captions, listing of The Aftermath Grant Winners & Finalist, four-color lithography, printed by EBS, Verona, Italy

Photobook designer: Teun van der Heijden

Notes: Background: The Aftermath Project is a non-profit, grant-making organization which for the past ten years has supported the work of photographers documenting the aftermath of conflict. Their stated mission is to change the way the media covers conflict, and to broaden the public’s understanding of the true cost of war and the real price of peace.

This is a retrospective monograph of the series of annual War is only Half the Story photobooks that have been curated and published by Sara Terry’s The Aftermath Project. It is a collection of singular images, extracted from the various photographic investigational projects that have been supported over the past 10 years, structured around the poetry of Wislawa Szymborska. This is an extremely impressive recall of the broad scope of this important initiative.

Terry states that her goal with this monograph is “to let the images speak to each other… created a dialogue that’s never been heard before, a post-conflict visual symphony, one that invites you to listen over and over again.”

The individual images are visually searing; images and narratives that I first came to know as each of these annual stiff-cover books were published by The Aftermath Project. Which have, if it seems possible, even a stronger emotional impact in the context of this monograph. Some of these images can be very difficult to view; to witness what someone else has experienced and the tragic enormity of the consequences of events like war and hatred have created.

The documentary photographers and photo-journalist whose work is included is extremely broad, a virtual who’s-who of this genre of investigative work. To Terry and her editorial team’s credit, their grants and support represents an extremely broad international selection of photographers, from the well-known to the relatively unknown, including Donald Weber, Nina Berman, Jim Goldberg, Louie Paul, Jessica Hines, Stanley Greene, Kathryn Cook, Javad Parsa, and Justyna Mielnikiewicz to name only a few. All of whom have a difficult story to share and narrate.

There is still a measure of hope of in how the individuals and groups are documented in their attempts to rebuild their lives after such devastating carnage and loss. It can be difficult to comprehend the emotional impact to these individuals, especially when we are confronted with similar images of loss every day in the news. At times it just seems unrelenting.

This monograph is an elegant and touching ten year synopsis of this extensive body of work by Terry and the Aftermath Project. A testimony to the fact that after the conflict ends, not all of the photographers leave.

Nevertheless, one has to wonder how does another ignorant and ill-informed world leader come to power, who does not seem to know or even want to understand “the cost of war and the price of peace”?

The Aftermath Project annual editions (Volumes) that have been previously featured on TPBJ include: Volume II, Volume V, Volume VIII

The Aftermath Project just announced a $25,000 grant for 2019. Details on their web site.

Cheers, Doug

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