With the recent terror level set to ‘high’ and numerous wars currently occurring around the world, in Australia we are anxious about our security and what war would look like here, in this country that we profoundly value. Gianluca Panella’s photographs from his series titled ‘Gaza Blackout’ (2013) reveal the harsh consequences of war in an unfamiliar way (World Press Photo, 2014). Rather than simply depicting a war-torn city, Panella uses photography to show us the desert-like city Gaza has become as a result of the turmoil in the Middle East.
Panella started out as a self-taught photojournalist who worked on social reportage, current affairs and portraiture (Panella, 2014). His interest in the recent downfall of Gaza has resulted in the completion of ‘Gaza Blackout’. Gaza has had difficulties sourcing diesel fuel from Egypt and Israel, to keep up with electricity demand, because of the political issues between these countries. Electricity has therefore become intermittent in Gaza; blackouts occur for about ten hours per day, and sometimes even longer. It is this darkened cityscape that Panella depicts so powerfully in ‘Gaza Blackout’ (Ozarts Etc, 2014). Bringing the issue to light through these photographs, Panella succeeds in portraying a disconnected city, while providing a snapshot into Gaza’s possibly hopeless future. This is seen particularly in the first three photographs in the series.
Rather than reproducing the usual images of front-line battles associated with the theme of international conflict, ‘Gaza Blackout’ takes an alternative look at war, conveyed through the peculiar city-like setting. It is evident that humans have been purposefully omitted from the series as it seems strange that in a small area with more than 1.8 million residents, there are... The rest of this article is available to subscribers of Eyeline