Arts: The Faces of the Iraq War, Ten Years Later

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Behold The Faces of the Iraq War, Ten Years Later By David Rosenberg Posted Tuesday, Mar 19, 2013, at 03:23 PM ET Franco Pagetti considers himself to be a lucky guy. It's a logical statement coming from a photojournalist who wanted to tell a unique and important story. Pagetti arrived in Iraq a few months before the start of the war and photographed continuously through 2008. Pagetti's work during that time, titled Flashback Iraq will be on view at the VII gallery in Brooklyn from March 19 through April 12. The opening of the show coincides with the 10-year anniversary of the American invasion of Iraq. Although Pagetti started his career as a fashion photographer (he still shoots for Vogue), he dedicated himself to news photojournalism in 1994 and has covered conflict in places such as Kosovo, Afghanistan, Palestine, and Israel. But it was Iraq where he felt he first encountered "real" war and possibly got his idea of being a "lucky" photographer. Pagetti had been reading about Iraq and decided he wanted to start documenting events in the country. He was unable to secure a visa through the Iraqi Embassy, but a chance meeting with a mysterious woman in an antiques shop in Italy proved to be a fortuitous encounter. "She was the kind of person I never would have thought could have been able to help me," Pagetti explained. "She was sitting on a sofa, smoking a cigarette, dressed in a way that is not usually like the people I'm spending my time with—a little bit snobbish." The woman told Pagetti to give her his passport ... To continue reading, click here. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES Also In Slate The GOP, Now With Less Crazy Your Favorite Show Is Too Long Here We Go, Blue Team, Here We Go	Advertisement
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