Seamus Kealy

A unique and engaging exploration of how the camera lens has shaped public perceptions of the atomic age and its legacy of anxiety. The images featured are extremely vivid and were taken by famed photographers including Weegee, Barbara Kruger, Sandy Skoglund and Garry Winogrand from some of the nuclear events from 1945 onwards.

Wherever there have been nuclear weapons and nuclear fission, there have also been cameras. Camera Atomica explores the intimate relationship between photography and nuclear events, to uncover how the camera lens has shaped public perceptions of the atomic age and its anxieties. Photographs have a crucial place in the representation of the atomic age and its anxieties. Co-published to coincide with a major exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 2015.

Camera Atomica examines narratives beyond the “technological sublime” that dominates much nuclear photography, suppressing representations of the human form in favour of representations of B-52 bombers and mushroom clouds. The book proposes that the body is the site where the social environment interacts with the so-called “atomic road”: uranium mining and processing, radiation research, nuclear reactor construction and operation, and weapons testing. Cameras have both recorded and – in certain instances – provided motivation for the production of nuclear events. Their histories and technological development are intimately intertwined. All photographs, including nuclear photographs, have the capability to function affectively by working on the emotions and fascinating audiences.

Through a wide range of visual documentation, Camera Atomica raises questions such as: what has the role of photography been in underwriting a public image of the bomb and nuclear energy? Has the circulation of photographic images heightened or lessened anxieties, or done both at the same time? How should the different visual protocols of photography be understood?

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