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1998 Visa d'or Feature: Zed Nelson. “Gun Nation is a reflection on America's deadly love affair with the gun, exploring the paradox of why the nation's most potent symbol of freedom is also one of its greatest killers. I tried to extend the traditional language and style of documentary photography, employing formal portraiture, reportage and carefully observed still-life images. It became a vital tool to tell the story in an original and thought-provoking way. It was a great honor to receive the Visa d’or at Perpignan for this work. I had first visited the festival as a young photographer, and I had found the exhibitions greatly inspiring. There was no doubt as to the sincerity and devotion displayed by the photographers in their work, and by Jean-François Leroy in his obsessive dedication to showing photojournalism that engages subjects increasingly ignored by an increasingly commercially-driven media. After earning this recognition at Perpignan, my project went on to win a number of other awards, became a cover story in TIME and was published as a book in 2000”. (Photo by Zed Nelson)
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