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Through a lens darkly
A new exhibition shows why Don McCullin is such a brilliant chronicler of a conflicted world, says JOHN GREEN
Local Boys in Bradford, 1972

Don McCullin
Tate Britain

AS SOON as you enter this monumental retrospective celebrating Don McCullin’s life and work, you are immediately aware of being confronted with a treasure trove of one of the world’s foremost photojournalists in a full tour of his almost 70 years as a photographer.

Grenade Thrower, Hue, Vietnam, 1968

It begins in the early 1950s, with iconic shots taken around his home stomping ground of East London. “The guvnors,” depicting a gang of youngsters lounging with proprietorial arrogance on the first floor of a skeletal half-demolished house in Finsbury Park, is like a stage set from West Side Story. And there are early photos of police taking action against anti-fascist demonstrators and CND marchers.

Derry, 1971
The Bogside, Derry, 1971
Protester, Cuban Missile Crisis, Whitehall, London 1962
Seaside pier on the south coast, Eastbourne, UK 1970s
Sheep going to the slaughter house in the early morning near Caledonia Road, 1995
Near Checkpoint Charlie, Berlin 1961
The theatre on the Roman city of Palmyra, party destroyed by Islamic State fighters 2017
Woods near my house, Somerset, 1991
The Guvnors in their Sunday suits, Finsbury Park, London, 1958
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