Let’s face it: America has a penchant for drama. The past 90 years of U.S. history, as captured by Magnum photographers, feel less like a coherent narrative and more like a collection of fever dreams stitched together with duct tape. Magnum’s new coffee-table tome, Magnum America, does us all the favor of slicing through the muddled mess, handpicking moments that make us pause, laugh, cry, and sometimes just roll our eyes. Curated by photojournalists Peter van Agtmael and Laura Wexler, this 600-image anthology promises a candid peek into the chaos. Buckle up, folks—this is going to be a ride.
1. 1940s: Robert Capa’s “Blurred Soldier at Omaha Beach”
Nothing says “American history” quite like Robert Capa’s shaky shot of a U.S. soldier during the D-Day landing. Of course, we’re told the blurriness isn’t just a result of nerves or panic—no, this is art. Let’s give credit where it’s due: Capa captured an iconic moment of chaos and carnage. But here’s the kicker: he supposedly took 106 photos, yet only a handful survived thanks to a lab mishap. Those of us who’ve lost a whole phone photo library feel his pain, but somehow it’s hard to shake the suspicion that Capa’s storytelling flair might have edited the narrative a bit. Still, even if “accidents” reduced his haul, the images that survived give us a gritty taste of the horror, uncertainty, and blurred lines that defined a “good” war.
2. 1950s: Elliott Erwitt’s “Separate but Definitely Not Equal” Drinking Fountains
Ah, the 1950s—a golden age for segregationists and magazine editors who thought titles like Wilmington, North Carolina, 1950 would fly under the radar. Here we have Elliott Erwitt’s potent snapshot of America’s segregation era, with its “White” and “Colored” drinking fountains, positioned like a sneering visual representation of “freedom” for some but definitely not all. Erwitt’s quiet commentary doesn’t shout or protest—it just exists. The result? A bleakly funny punchline for anyone who’d rather rewrite history to forget such scenes ever existed.
3. 1960s: Paul Fusco’s “Kennedy Funeral Train”
If America’s 1960s was a TV show, Fusco’s funeral train series would be its weepy season finale. The nation watched as Bobby Kennedy’s coffin traveled across the country, and Fusco captured a haunting series of scenes that Look magazine promptly ignored. Fast forward 30 years, and these hidden frames finally emerged, offering us an eerily tranquil tribute from average Americans, some holding handmade signs, others simply standing by as if they, too, were a somber part of the funeral procession. It’s an oddly poetic finale, made more poignant by the lost decades of unseen images.
4. 1970s: Alex Webb’s “The Nixon Resignation Headline”
Nixon’s resignation was America’s pre-cable-TV version of a scandal binge, complete with all the political shenanigans one could hope for. Nixon stepped down, The Washington Post headlined “Nixon Resigns,” and Alex Webb gave us the singular image of a person engrossed in this no-duh headline on a newspaper. Nixon’s departure wasn’t just a moment in history—it was a new low. In retrospect, the sheer simplicity of the “Nixon Resigns” headline became the gold standard for presidential disgrace. Alex Webb’s image nailed the anticlimactic yet historic vibe: all the mess, now packed into two words.
5. 1980s: Susan Meiselas’s “Undocumented Immigrants at the Drop-Off Site”
Long before Trump dreamt up his “big, beautiful wall,” Susan Meiselas was documenting the reality of America’s southern border. Her image of undocumented workers, standing in a desolate area after a brutal journey, isn’t a feel-good story. The shot is stark and raw, much like the politics that brought these people here. It’s a brutal look at the lengths people will go to for the fabled “American Dream”—a promise still being sold, despite growing cracks in the story.
6. 1990s: Eli Reed’s “Nation of Islam in the Ruins of the Rodney King Riots”
The 1990s weren’t ready for Eli Reed, the first Black photographer to join Magnum, capturing what it means to be Black in America. In this shot, members of the Nation of Islam stand stoic among the wreckage left by the Rodney King riots. It’s a perfect encapsulation of post-civil-rights-era America: groups on the margins trying to hold it together while the center falls apart. If only Reed had a time machine—he’d see that this fight, this need for justice, didn’t end in the ’90s; it barely even took a break.
7. 2000s: Thomas Hoepker’s “Casual Afternoon of 9/11 in Brooklyn”
And then came the early 2000s, where the terror attack on the World Trade Center left a scar that would never fully heal. Hoepker’s image, however, wasn’t about the horror of the towers falling. Instead, he captured five young people lounging by the East River, as if casually basking in the chaos across the water. It was instantly divisive—some saw it as a symbol of desensitization, others as a deeply misunderstood capture of trauma in real time. When one of the people in the image responded years later, saying they were in shock, it underscored the gap between the photo’s intentions and its impact. Sometimes, the most haunting images don’t make sense—they just are.
8. 2010s: Alec Soth’s “School Lockdown Drill in Minneapolis”
Oh, the 2010s, where the words “school” and “shooting” became disturbingly common bedfellows. Alec Soth’s image captures this chilling new reality with kids crouched by red lockers during a lockdown drill at Belle Plaine High School. In many American schools today, such drills are as routine as fire drills. Soth’s image takes us into the disturbing normalization of gun violence—students in a daily ritual of dread, practicing for a tragedy that everyone hopes will never happen but that too many know will. The photograph’s stillness somehow makes the whole spectacle feel inevitable, a routine without reason in a land where laws and lives don’t seem to matter equally.
9. 2020s: Peter van Agtmael’s “The Capitol Riot”
And here we are, at the grand finale. January 6, 2021: when a mob stormed the Capitol, draped in the American flag and fuelled by years of political gaslighting. Peter van Agtmael captured one rioter clinging to the Capitol walls like he was auditioning for a role in a low-budget action movie. Behind him, a writhing mass of protesters stands in chaotic opposition to the monument behind them, itself a symbol of democracy’s fragility. Van Agtmael’s image feels more like a teaser trailer than an ending, suggesting that America’s next act might be even messier than the last.
Closing Thoughts: America, We Need to Talk
In all seriousness, Magnum America is a stark, sweeping, often uncomfortable mirror. These photographs are less a chronicle of a unified nation and more a jigsaw puzzle, with crucial pieces scattered, lost, or burned by a careless lab assistant (looking at you, Capa). If these images tell us anything, it’s that the U.S. isn’t so much a “melting pot” as a boiling-over pressure cooker.
Each image here stands alone as its own world—a fractured, messy world that might never be whole but can still be captured in unforgettable moments, one chaotic frame at a time. So here’s to Magnum and to American history, still as fractured, frustrating, and ferociously photogenic as ever.