While I was combing the internet for something bizarre to write about, I came across the Atomic Photographers Guild. Ever since I heard about this asteroid that has a 3.1% chance/96.9% non-chance of hitting Earth in 2032, I’ve been thinking about nuclear bombs. I think that’s because I watched a video where a scientist explained that if, indeed, this asteroid hits the Earth in 2032, we should remember that we’ve detonated nuclear bombs with 50x-100x the force of the asteroid impact. That got me thinking about how unbelievably disrespectful the human race has been towards Mother Earth. The war and weapons industries above all, have been HUGE pieces of shit to our planet, detonating bombs that hit her with the force of 100 asteroids. And why are we still here? Why do we feel we deserve to be here? Oh yeah, Jesus.
Anyway, the Atomic Photographers Guild is an international collective of photographers who have captured every aspect of the nuclear sciences on film — “nuclear weapons and war; nuclear energy and medicine; extraction industries; transportation practices; and nuclear contamination and wastes.” It should be recommended to every human being on this planet, because the images and stories that these photographers have been documenting for the past century show the way we’re most likely going to end our short stint on this planet. Whether our mother Earth is warming up or cooling down, she’s not going to get rid of us as quickly as these atomic fusions will.
Check out a few of the stunning photographs on this site below, and please take some time to look through the site and contemplate how we the people might be able to stop the insane razing-and-casino-building warmongers who run our societies.
Berlyn Brixner
Berlyn Brixner was the head photographer for the Manhattan Project’s Trinity Test, the first detonation of a nuclear (plutonium fission) weapon. This detonation occurred on July 16, 1945 in Alamogordo, New Mexico.
The film strip that captured the complete detonation of the Trinity atomic bomb test as a result of Brixner’s efforts is not generally considered to be as artistically important as it is scientifically important. But from a moral, sociological, and political point of view, it contains some of the most significant images captured on celluloid film of the twentieth century. Brixner’s images of Trinity captured the intensity, violence, and horror of the first nuclear weapon ever detonated. Beryln Brixner was the first atomic photographer.
– David A. Wargowski, Atomic Heritage Foundation
Yoshito Matsushige
Yoshito Matsushige is best known for being the only person to capture an immediate, first-hand photographic historical account of the destruction of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.
“Those of us who experienced all these hardships, we hope that such suffering will never be experienced again by our children and our grandchildren. Not only our children and grandchildren, but all future generations should not have to go through this tragedy. That is why I want young people to listen to our testimonies and to choose the right path, the path which leads to peace.”
Dr. Peter C. van Wyck
Highway of the Atom (McGill-Queen’s UP 2010)
At the outset, this “highway” references a palimpsestic economic and colonial path or route used initially by Europeans carrying furs, food, and disease, and subsequently carrying radium and then uranium. This material passed through the North of Canada, leaking as it went, to Port Hope, Ontario where the ore was processed and the town contaminated, and then into the productive centres of World War II – the various sites associated with the Manhattan Project – and subsequently extended itself over the clear morning skies of Hiroshima and then Nagasaki, and back again into the community of Great Bear Lake in the form of cancers, stories, addictions, and depression; hauntings.
David McMillan
David McMillan was born in Scotland and educated in the United States. In 1994, his interest in the often uneasy relationship between nature and culture led him to visit the guarded zone surrounding the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, which had been evacuated because of the enormous amount of radiation released in the 1986 accident. Within this circumscribed area, several “themes” emerged – the existential threat posed by technology, the resilience of nature, and the transience of culture. Since his initial visit to the exclusion zone, McMillan has returned 21 times.
