The news came Tuesday that Camille Lepage was found dead in the Central African Republic. Lepage, as Nicholas Kulish writes in the Times, was a French photographer who had done work for The New York Times and others in war zones around the globe. He described her as someone always looking to tell the stories of those in extremis, of those whose stories otherwise would not be told.
Kulish’s reflection on Lepage reminds us of the dangers that so many journalists face — both overseas and, to a lesser degree, in the United States — and reminder that what we do matters. In age when celebrity gossip and horse-race political journalism hold sway, it is important to remember that the journalist is not only the eyes and ears of the public, but also the mouthpiece of those without power, and often the only way that the powerless can be heard. We bear witness — in Sudan and Central Africa, in Israel and Palestine, in Detroit, Trenton and Newark.
A few weeks ago, I was speaking on a panel at Rutgers on the topic of homelessness and the Tent City homeless camp in Lakewood (it was tied to my friend Jack Ballo’s film Destiny’s Bridge and my own long poem As an Alien in a Land of Promise). We were asked what could be done. My answer, speaking as a journalist and artist, was simple: I challenged my journalism students to act as witnesses, to get into the communities and find those in need. Tell their stories, I said. And I meant it.
Lepage and the journalists who work in war zones around the globe do that under the most dangerous of circumstances. The stories they bring us may not help us make sense of the world — how can they? — but they help us see things we otherwise might be happy to leave in the shadows. They tell us that war and poverty and violence are still all too real and, in doing so, they just might reach those one or two or three readers or viewers moved enough to start agitating for change.
You can see her breathtaking photos here.
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Hank Kalet 