Wildfires: an astonishing photograph of survivors in an age of catastrophe

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/09/australian-wildfires-astonishing-photograph

Version 0 of 1.

The old newspaper saying that a good picture is worth a thousand words has rarely been proved more dramatically than it was when grandfather Tim Holmes took his family to shelter in the sea while fire consumed their Tasmania community – and remembered to bring along a camera.

2013 has barely begun but this photograph of Holmes's wife and their grandchildren sheltering from the wildfires in sea water under a jetty will surely be remembered 12 months from now as one of the year's defining news images. Holmes is a potter, so he evidently has an artistic side that is apparent in his compelling photograph. Maybe he knows a lot about photography, for his picture has the compassion of classic photojournalism from Walker Evans to Don McCullin.

This is what can happen when the modern democratisation of photography meets a colossal news event. No professional journalist was waiting in the sea to snap this moment – but Holmes has done a remarkable job. This is citizen photojournalism at its finest. Only someone who experienced this event, cut off by fire from the rest of the world, could record it, and only in this century is such a level of photographic excellence likely to be achieved by a non-professional who just happened to be there.

It is the extremity of the situation he and his family are in that makes the picture so astonishing – we hear news of wildfires, see the aftermath, and read names of victims, but to actually be at the heart of such a natural catastrophe and survive seems almost impossible. The fact that five children are in this desperate scene makes it all the more harrowing. They really look like kids who live Tasmania – like they spend a lot of time running around in the wild. They are strong: terrified yet self-controlled. The children's mother, who was cut off outside the disaster area, has said only her eldest daughter can swim, and the sea was extremely cold. But they abide.

It is an image of survival, which also guarantees its global interest. In an age of catastrophe, these people have found a way to live through the worst. They will be fine. They will outlive their home and start again. It is such a flame-seared image, we might be seeing the end of civilisation – and a family tough enough to outlive it.

What else does the picture tell? As temperatures soared to burning point in Tasmania, the Met Office in Britain issued a downward-revised model of its predicted global temperature rises to 2017. Climate change sceptics leapt on the figures – and their supposed news-burial on 24 December – while climate scientists rushed to explain them. On the ground, the climate seems all askew. From the waters of Hurricane Sandy to the fires of Tasmania, the results of global warming seem all too apparent. Scientific evidence is apparently more debatable. Perhaps infinitely debatable.

Why not be prepared? The survival of the Holmes family in this picture is no chance piece of good luck. The fact that Holmes even took his camera suggests he had long ago conceived this emergency plan. Survivors are people – or societies – who look danger in the face and deal with it, instead of waiting for the fire.