The Landscape

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McCullin is a striking person to spend time with, still consumed by photography, good-humoured and reflective about the craft and ethics of his profession – but the conflict that has shaped his life is never far from the surface. I tell him that this comes through even in his photographs of the countryside. ‘You may also consider that I’m poisoning it, by the way I present it,’ he says. ‘But you’ve got to love somewhere like this to be able to bring the best out of it.’ The exhibition continues to explore McCullin’s documentation across the United Kingdom, featuring pensive rural scenes that include Hadrian’s Wall, Northumberland; the River Cam, Cambridgeshire; Rannoch Moor and Glencoe, Scotland. These images are presented in contrast to poignant urban landscapes from McCullin’s early career and visits to Northern England between the 1960s – 70s. McCullin’s honest and empathetic approach towards years of widespread British poverty, social concerns and hardship is most apparent in this body of work, highlighting a genuine commitment to communities often overlooked and the landscape in which they inhabit.

One of the best contemporary landscape photographers working today, you would be hard-pushed to find a brand new copy of any of Rachael Talibart’s books – which is a testament to how popular they are. You should be able to find second-hand copies of Sirens, however, which showcases her critically acclaimed seascape and wave work – the monstrous waves being named after mythological beings. Beautiful and considered work, this would be a fantastic addition to any budding landscape photographer’s shelf. McCullin travelled to Germany in 1961 to photograph the building of the Berlin Wall. After the Second World War, Europe had become a divided continent formed of capitalist countries in the west and communist regimes in the east. The economic situation was significantly poorer in Eastern Europe, with food and housing in short supply, as well as restrictions on individual freedoms. Germany was split into four zones, controlled by Britain, the US, France and Russia. The three western areas formed West Germany. The Soviet-controlled zone became East Germany. The capital city, Berlin, located within the Soviet zone, was similarly divided. In 2012, nine years after announcing his retirement, McCullin spent a week in Aleppo, where he came under sniper fire while documenting the Syrian civil war on assignment for a newspaper. “I wanted one last look at what was going on, to make sure that what I did in the past wasn’t a dream,” he explains. “And when I got there, it was exactly like my days in Beirut. The streets were awash with people with Kalashnikovs. I thought, ‘Boy, how little has changed.’” McCullin was deeply affected by the trauma of reporting from some of the most violent conflicts of the second half of the twentieth century. When he returned home from these assignments, he often turned his attention to the tough lives of people in Britain. He photographed communities living in northern cities like Bradford and Liverpool, focusing on areas that had been neglected and left impoverished by policies of deindustrialisation. Often these trips were made on his own initiative, rather than being sent on assignment by a newspaper. McCullin saw similarities between their lives and his own childhood. Although he was ‘reporting’ on poverty and social crisis, he also identified deeply with his subjects, picturing the lives of others as a means of learning more about himself.He’s never been so interested in the technicalities of photography. "All you have to do in photography is get the exposure right and then adjust your camera," he says. But that’s not all. "What you have to do is to adjust your mind, your emotions. That is the most important part." The Sunday Times Magazine sent McCullin on several assignments to cover the Cambodian Civil War. The military conflict ran from 1967 to 1975. It primarily pitted the Communist Party of Kampuchea (the Khmer Rouge), their communist allies in North Vietnam and the Viêt Công, against the Kingdom of Cambodia.

About the Artist Don McCullin is one of the most important war photographers of the late twentieth century, best known for his broad war reportage and critical social documentation. Between 1966 and 1984, he worked for The Sunday Times Magazine under Editor-in-Chief Harold Evans and Art Editor David King, it was during this time he released his most celebrated images. He has since expanded his oeuvre with independent trips to India, Africa and the Middle East, continuing to raise awareness of global humanatarian issues and war-torn areas with unflinching honesty. At home he has spent three decades chronicling the English countryside – in particular the landscapes of Somerset – and creating meticulously constructed still lifes all to great acclaim. Yet he still feels the lure of war. As recently as October 2015 Don travelled to Kurdistan in northern Iraq to photograph the Kurds’ three-way struggle with ISIS, Syria and Turkey. My name is Don McCullin. I’m a photographer. Of course Tate Gallery have very kindly invited me to show some of my work here which is a great honour for me. It’s slightly out of the ordinary because I’m sadly known as a war photographer which I really hate being spoken of in that light, but what’s happened here today is we have chosen, or the curator here, Simon Baker, has chosen a set of my pictures that doesn’t show any signs of war despite the fact there is a section on that building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, which in many people’s eyes thought was the outbreak of the Third World War or could have been. FR: Is that because of what you’ve seen in life, or because of where you’ve come from in life? Are you talking about your life as a war photographer, or are you talking about the neighborhood where you grew up—a sense of fairness of play?And so I had to make that camera do everything. I tried every way of using that camera to get a different angle. The Russians and the Americans were facing each other with armoured vehicles and, you know, you look into these photographs, and we’re looking…a lot of them, you’re looking into East Berlin, and if you look at the uniforms of the East Berlin police and soldiers, they are very reminiscent of Nazi uniforms that you would have seen in the Second World War. I was using that kind of atmosphere to show tension, really, and division. In 1971 the Sunday Times Magazine sent McCullin on one of many assignments to Northern Ireland. His photographs were published as part of a photo-story entitled ‘War on the Home Front’. They document a period of intense political violence during the thirty-year conflict known as the Troubles.

The Lebanese Civil War was a complex conflict which lasted from 1975 until 1990. It resulted in many fatalities and displaced people. Before the Civil War, Lebanon was made up of and ruled by a culturally and ethnically diverse group of people. Most of the people in the coastal cities were Sunni Muslims and Christians, with Shia Muslims in the south and east, and Druze and Christian populations in the mountainous regions. However, the country’s proWestern parliamentary structure was biased towards Christians. When the state of Israel was established in 1948, vast numbers of Palestinian refugees fled to Lebanon. This resulted in a shift in the country’s majority religion from Christianity to Islam. Left-wing pan-Arabist and Muslim Lebanese groups, who already opposed the pro-Western government, allied themselves with the Palestinians. Tensions had been rising for some time and, in 1975, fighting began between the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Maronite Christians. Later the same year, Palestinian civilians travelling on a bus in Beirut were killed by Christian Phalangists. Among those others is actor, director and UN special envoy for refugees Angelina Jolie. She invited McCullin to Rome recently to discuss her plan to make a film of his life, based on his 2002 autobiography Unreasonable Behaviour. Tom Hardy was initially rumoured to be lined up to play him, but was apparently deemed too old. “She’s an incredibly lovely woman,” says McCullin. “She’s determined to make this. She said, ‘I’ve got an office in LA with all your pictures on the wall and I want to do this.’” Photojournalism isn’t quite dead then: it still speaks from the walls to Angelina Jolie.In the decades that followed, often on assignment for The Sunday Times Magazine, he photographed many wars, revolutions and famines, including conflicts in the Congo, Biafra and Vietnam, as well as Cambodia, Northern Ireland and Lebanon. In Vietnam, he once said, he saw men run over by tanks who looked like Persian carpets on the road: “It was total madness.” Yet, by his own admission, he became a “war junkie”. Sir Don McCullin CBE is one of the most important war photographers of the late twentieth century, best known for his broad war reportage and critical social documentation. Between 1966 and 1984, he worked for The Sunday Times Magazine under Editor-in-Chief Harold Evans and Art Editor David King. It was during this time he released his most celebrated images. He has since expanded his oeuvre with independent trips to India, Africa and the Middle East, continuing to raise awareness of global humanitarian issues and war-torn areas with un inching honesty. FR: But it seems to me you’re also trying to find a meaning in life, what’s good in life or what’s important, or as you say, dignified. The war itself is the abattoir. War itself is the meaninglessness of life, and somehow that is there, even in your landscapes and the Roman work. You’re finding something else, something spiritual, some other kinds of answers in life. Don McCullin. The Stillness of Life‘ will be on view at Hauser & Wirth Somerset until 6 September 2020. Photography for me is not looking, it’s feeling. If you can’t feel what you’re looking at, then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures.”

The Lebanese Civil War was a complex conflict which lasted from 1975 until 1990. Following the Second World War the nation gained its independence from France, with the Maronite Christians assuming government control. When the state of Israel was established in 1948, vast numbers of Palestinian refugees fled to Lebanon. This resulted in a shift in the country’s majority religion from Christianity to Islam. Muslim political groups, who already opposed the pro-Western government, allied themselves with the Palestinians. Tensions had been rising for some time and, in 1975, fighting began between the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Maronite Christians. Don McCullin: I’d like to get away from the awful reputation of being a war photographer. I think, in a way, it’s parallel to calling me a kind of abattoir worker, somebody who works with the dead, or an undertaker or something. I’m none of those things. I went to war to photograph it in a compassionate way, and I came to the conclusion that it was a filthy, vile business. War—it was tragic, and it was awful, and I was witness to murder and terrible cruelty. So do I need a title for that? The answer is no, I don’t. I hate being called a war photographer. It’s almost an insult. Does he see himself primarily as a photojournalist – or does he prefer to consider himself an artist? “Neither!” he says forcefully. “I hate the word ‘art’ being associated with photography. There’s no need for it. I’m a photographer. I’m quite happy with that title. I also see myself as someone who records history. So I’m not a reporter but a person who recorded time and events – and, sadly, tragedy.”He saw dead and dying children. He saw what shrapnel did to a human face. "When you saw all those things you calmed down. The adrenalin rush you got in the beginning started to go."