Steve Mccurry Argumentative Essay

Steve McCurry should not be on a scandal because he does not have responsibility to deliver actual fact, news material, to viewers because he is a story teller not a photojournalist. Mark Twain, William Shakespeare, Leo Tolstoy, Ernest Hemingway, there are tons of great author who touched readers’ heart. Writers can use excellent choice of words, structure, tones, and other elements to sympathize with readers and to express their story. On the other hand, photographers need to represent their entire story or emotions with single click of shutter of camera. This limitation leads to a controversial argument, whether photographers can use Photoshop or not on their image because Photoshop provides freedom of visual story to photographers. However,

Steve McCurry became popular as National Geographic uses “Afghan girl” as their cover page, also he is a member of Magnum Photos, an international photographic cooperative. The scandal rises as Italian photographer named Paolo Vigilone, post altered photos by McCurry on his blog. People claimed that McCurry should not use the Photoshop because they tend to believe that he is a photojournalist who needs to deliver facts. This assumption comes from his awards, he won the Robert Capa Gold Medal for Best Photographic Reporting from Abroad, an award dedicated to photographers exhibiting exceptional courage and enterprise by photos that cover international and civil conflict, including Beirut, the Philippines, Cambodia the Gulf War, the former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, and Tibet. (2) For this reason, many people consider him as photojournalist as he covers new material. However, McCurry said “Today I would define my work as visual storytelling, because the pictures have been shot in many places, for many reasons, and in many situations. Much of my recent work has been shot for my own enjoyment in places I wanted to visit to satisfy my curiosity about the people and the culture. For example, my Cuba work was taken during four personal trips.”