Don McCullin, the Battle for the City of Hue, South Vietnam, 1968 © Don McCullin
As a major retrospective of Sir Donald McCullin’s work opens at Tate Britain, Judith Schrut looks at what his 60 years of photography have given us.
If you’ve heard of Don McCullin (born 1935) you probably think of him as a war photographer. His pictures of Vietnam are iconic– as are those of wars in Belfast and Beirut– and wars you may have forgotten in Bangladesh, Biafra, Cyprus and the Congo, to name a few that he has covered in more than half a century. But what you get in this major retrospective of Don McCullin’s life and work at Tate Britain is not just the horror of war but the concern of a man who really cares. “If you can’t feel what you’re looking at” he says, “then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures”.
The exhibition features over 250 images, all photographed and, unusually, printed by the artist. It includes excellent summaries of the context of events he’s recorded. The sheer range of McCullin’s work is astonishing: photographs of the Berlin Wall being built; of the Six Day War and continuing conflicts in the Middle East; photographs of India, “the most visually exciting place in the world“; coverage of ancient architecture in Syria, much now destroyed by ISIS; the Somerset Levels under water; still lifes shot on his kitchen table and landscapes shot in his back garden. Examples of his extensive colour magazine work are shown in a mesmerising giant screen digital presentation.
As you enter the exhibition there is a poster warning about the bloody content of many of the war pictures– though they are all black and white. What you are not warned of, however, is the hunger, poverty, sadness and desolation exposed in photographs McCullin has taken in London and Northern England. As he says in the many quotes accompanying the works on display, he feels he really has no right to be in these places and is concerned about having some form of consent to photograph those depicted. But, he is adamant, “You have to bear witness. You cannot look away … you go to bring back images that might change people’s opinions.”
Don McCullin, The Guvnors in their Sunday Suits, Finsbury Park, London 1958 © Don McCullin
If you’ve never heard of Don McCullin, see this show. And if you have, see this show to learn so much more about the man and his art.
Don McCullin runs until 6 May 2019 at Tate Britain, Millbank, SW1P 4RG . General museum admission free. Exhibition tickets £15-18, free for members and under 12s, £5 for 12-18s. More at tate.org.uk.
