Playing with perspective: the profanation of the access control in conflict scenarios during the Iraq War

Abstract The embedding of media professionals in military units marked the photojournalistic coverage of Iraq War (2003-11). On the one hand, this practice offered reporters the conditions to perform their activities; on the other, it restricted their freedom of action. In this paper, we propose to observe this device's constitution to control the access of photojournalists inside the conflict scenarios. We will discuss, in particular, the way the photographer Benjamin Lowy performs a profanation of it by playing both with his perspective and that one of the soldiers.