16 Photographs

I have picked out 16 photographs which still make me ponder now on the cruelty, beauty and horror of us and our Planet.

Buddhist Fire    1963

There are many photographs which are too gruesome or gory to make it onto the news but that doesn't mean that the ones deemed worthy are not heart-breakingly awful and hard to look at.
Monk Thich Quang Duc, sat down on a cushion at a busy Vietnamese crossroads, poured a can of petrol over himself and said a prayer before striking a match and dropping it on himself.
It was inj protest at the rising rivalry between the Catholics and the Buddhists and witnesses state that the Monk didn't even move and remained absolutely still even while burning.
US President, John F. Kennedy, said of of the photograph: 'No news picture in history has generated so much emotion around the world' and the photographer, Malcolm Browne, described the scene he captured as: 'Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring. In the air was the smell of burning human flesh. As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.'