Remembers the Nazi's End, 70 Years Ago, in Her Youth

The old Ukraine woman shows her feelings on the date of the 70th anniversary,

May 9th of Victory in Europe (V-E Day) when the Nazi regime finally was

conquered, an event that happened when she was in her youth and which she

obviously remembers with much emotion.. Your ratings, critiques and

observations are invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly, very critically, or

wish to make a remark, please submit a helpful and constructive comment;

please share your photographic knowledge to help improve my photography.

Thanks! Enjoy! john

Good. It's about the subject. Nothing interferes.

Empathic.
It also shows the importance of having an explaining text attached to the image. 
John this image is really a source of inspiration for me and others.

I appreciate the text as well to realize the context, but this image is so strong that speaks for itself. So evocative and so emotional.

Congrats John for such an acheivment.

Regards,

ricardo

I appreciate your comment.  This is a telephoto shot, so the background is mostly in bokeh, even with a DX format sensor, due to the longer millimeter lens.

But although this one's about the 'subject', as you noted, I take all kinds.

I looked at one of my better shots from today, and it shows four or five people on a park bench. One woman is shown with her hand and arm in motion, as it carries through from slapping (playfully I think), the guy next to her who was flirting with her, his head being whipped away, the guy nearer to me showing interest in a woman even nearer, and her looking away from him, and with her arm she was inspecting her neck and apparently with that hand there a tattoo that may have been irritating -- perhaps recently made.

In other words, pretty darn complex and with multiple stories.

I like 'em all.

It's just a matter of which one seems to fit the moment, and this particular one, on the 70th anniversary of V-E Day seemed a 'gimme', don't you think?

There really was little choice -- for this one it was 'now or never' -- or may be wait five or ten years for another 'significant' and newsworthy V-E anniversary.

When I grew up, there were comic books of GIs fighting the Germans in pillboxes, and then the GIs fighting the 'JAPS' often shown as monkey like or evil snipers who cowardly hid in trees sniping America's finest, but often were blasted out by flame throwers (liquid fire).

No mention of course or suggestion, that these same people would go on to bring you Nikon cameras and Toyota automobiles.

Go figure.

Times change.

Memories don't so much.

But people age, then die.

Revisionists write, then rewrite history.

Now, we read that Putin has told "Angela Merkel of Germany why Stalin (who being rehabilitated after post-Soviet Russians called him one of the worst mass murderers in the world and his rule 'genocidal'), HAD to make a pact with Hitler - after all . . . . and who better than to tell the story with a positive spin than Putin, who is now reviving Stalin a bit after Stalin's dark historical days under the Yeltsin and early Putin regimes.

Go figure again.

In another ten years, this woman here may not even be here to recount her childhood under the Nazis as they ravaged Ukraine, then a part of the Soviet Union -- and the Soviets had horrendous casualties and fought with tremendous bravery and HUGE losses.

Few Americans (who think WE won the war), know that in both WWI and WWII (The Great Patriotic War) that greatest losses were suffered by the Russians in BOTH world wars.  (Someone can challenge me on that, but I believe it to be true.)

I studied modern Russian and Soviet history and Marxism/Leninism (as a philosophy, etc., not as a follower or advocate) at Columbia, never thinking for a moment, I'd live in Russia, then Ukraine, as I have.

Again, go figure.

And in ten years . . . . where will I be? 

My thoughts may live on if printed.

I think my photos may have a better chance.

Best to you, and thanks.

john

John (Crosley)

That's a very good comment.

Garry Winogrand, who also went to Columbia, a three-year undergraduate on the 'rush 'em through just after WWII' plan, famously many times said that photos NEVER tell stories -- they're always just photos, and it's up to viewers to see or place the photo with the story.

I was a professional caption writer (among many, many other things) for Associated Press, for part of one year in their NY world headquarters, and I know well the job of a good caption as a 'pointer' to why one should look at and/or 'understand' the importance of a photo.

Here, the caption serves both purposes; though I think I could write it better, on reflection.

And although the photo could be of a woman with allergies or a cold and a runny nose or puffy eyes, the caption makes it clear, I think, and thus for this photo, as you note, the caption/title is necessary for full understanding.

Sometimes viewpoints vary on that.  Some say NO photo should require a caption, and that viewpoint serves most photos well, but not one with a context such as this, I think.

Points to ponder.

Thanks for a comment to chew on.

john

John (Crosley)

Thanks for a welcome comment -- I'll puff my chest up a little but at your fine comment.

Then, think for a moment, what if she just had allergies?  Or, as noted above, a cold?

And this was all a big misunderstanding?

Of course we know better, but do we always?

It helps to trust one's eyes with a photo interpretation, but it also helps to trust the photographer who presents it . . . . 

Just sayin . . . . 

I try to keep honest.

It works better that way with the viewers.

And my heart.

Those were mighty fine compliments; now that the didacticism is over, I'll take them to heart and hold them closely -- my reward, with my earnest thanks.

My best wishes to you.

john

John (Crosley)