Don McCullin

23 June - 23 September 2018

Los Angeles

Hauser & Wirth is proud to present the first gallery exhibition in the United States by British photographer Sir Don McCullin, CBE, including a selection of his acclaimed images of war from around the world and societal upheaval in his home country. This show is a prelude to McCullin’s forthcoming retrospective at Tate Britain in 2019, which will be the museum’s first survey for a living photographer.

The exhibition at Hauser & Wirth introduces American audiences to the photographer’s unique ability to convey the emotion and humanity of his subject matter with the unvarnished grit of traditional photojournalism.

The majority of works on view are limited-edition platinum prints, created through a special photographic process that delivers a particularly wide range of tones unattainable in more conventional gelatin silver prints. McCullin’s technical preferences amplify the humanity expressed by his photographs: ‘This work is therapeutic,’ he says. ‘I couldn’t be happier than when I am standing in the cold on Hadrian’s Wall, waiting for the right light. The platinums are the essence. They are as far as you can go with what I am trying to do and say.’

In addition to images of McCullin’s travels throughout the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and the English countryside, Hauser & Wirth’s presentation brings together McCullin’s indelible visual record of the construction of the Berlin Wall and the conflict in Northern Ireland. A few of McCullin’s remarkable photographs of the Vietnam War will also be exhibited here on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the bloodiest year of that conflict.

The exhibition will be accompanied by an installation in the Book & Printed Matter Lab, comprising archival materials from the photographer’s six-decade long career, including video footage, ephemera, and, most notably, his camera with a bullet hole that quite literally saved his life.

The exhibition begins with photographs of Northern Ireland, Berlin, and the Vietnam War that capture the human suffering McCullin witnessed. Growing up underprivileged in 1930s London and experiencing the ignorance, poverty, and bigotry associated with his own socioeconomic circumstances, the photographer is driven by a profound empathy for those less fortunate – a defining characteristic in his work.

Innately drawn to deep-seated conflicts, McCullin has spent decades documenting horrific situations around the world for an audience that might otherwise remain unaware. Harsh and bloody truths are revealed by his extensive documentation of the Vietnam War, where McCullin risked his life alongside those in combat. While many of his photographs from Vietnam bear witness to the daily atrocities against civilian, the images on view at Hauser & Wirth focus upon American soldiers and the physical and emotional impact of war on their bodies and soul. ‘Wounded Soldier against Wall, Vietnam, 1968’ reveals McCullin’s uncanny ability to frame subjects within religious and art historical visual tradition: this image of a wounded Marine, supported by two of his comrades, recalls the deposition of Christ from the cross, thereby generating a deep sense of spiritual communion with McCullin’s subject.

Similarly, the composition of ‘US Troops, Friedrichstrasse, Berlin, 1961,’ references the architecture of Orsanmichele in Florence, where statues of saints and patrons of various guilds ornament niches circumscribing the building’s exterior. McCullin’s photograph substitutes the saints for US troops on the lookout in the empty windows of a vacant building, forever frozen in contrapposto poses. The dramatic perspective of this shot, combined with the subtle reference to Renaissance Christian iconography, suggests his sympathetic reverence for the soldiers’ sacrifice.

Through all of his assignments, from the Vietnam and Biafra Wars, to the conflict in Northern Ireland, the Lebanese Civil War, the Belgian Congo crisis, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and the fall of Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh, McCullin has faced countless challenges and setbacks: wounded in Cambodia, he fell from a roof in Salvador during a gun battle and was imprisoned by the Idi Amin dictatorship in Uganda. He also contracted cerebral malaria in West Africa.

The exhibition further unfolds with images from McCullin’s travels to Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Libya, Lebanon, Syria, and the Sudan – locations where he documented local rituals, festivals, architecture, and people, enabling Western viewers to meditate on the expansiveness of world culture and daily praxis. ‘India, The Great Elephant Festival, The River Gangak, 1993’ depicts a crowd under a leafy canopy decorated with flowing fabrics illuminated by afternoon light. People encircle a central female figure turning toward the camera and away from the festival underway. The photograph exemplifies McCullin’s ability to engage his subjects’ gaze, transforming mere documentation into a direct dialogue with the viewer.

Among works on view are McCullin’s images of the English countryside and of his home in Somerset, England – more pastoral photographs that in their stark contrast to the images depicting violence, remind viewers that war and peace are forever in opposition. Over the last two decades, McCullin has turned his eyes to the world immediately surrounding him, citing the sweeping rural landscape as his greatest salvation and his final ode to a life of dearly wished-for peace.

Selected images

Fishermen, Scarborough Beach

1965

Bali, Taking Gifts to the Sea Gods

1982

Cranmore, Somerset, 1990s

1990s

A boy from the Surma tribe, Southern Ethiopia, 2003

2003

Aphrodite, found in the Hadrianic Baths of Leptis Magna, Tripoli Castle Museum, Tripoli, Libya, 2009

2009

Shell shocked US Marine, 1968

The Great Elephant Festival at the River Gandak, near Patna, India, 1987

Installation views

About the Artist

Don McCullin

Renowned for an extensive oeuvre spanning a remarkable seven-decade career, Sir Don McCullin stands among the most celebrated and important photographers of the late 20th century. A combination of raw, emotional imagery and refined artistic sensibility underlines McCullin’s reputation as a master of his medium, capable of capturing both the harsh realities of the world and its profound beauty. Throughout, McCullin has provided an unflinching view of humanitarian crises and conflicts worldwide, while later endeavours simultaneously showcase his creative expertise through carefully composed still lifes, landscapes, and archaeological studies that carry with them the same honesty and grit of his earlier photographs. This year, McCullin celebrates his 90th birthday and becomes the recipient of the University of Oxford’s prestigious Bodley Medal: Life and Work award (2025), for his outstanding contribution to photography and journalism.

Don McCullin was born in 1935 in Finsbury Park, London. In 1959, following his return from National Service with the RAF, and postings in Egypt, Kenya, and Cyprus, he earned his first commission with The Observer, for his much-acclaimed photograph of a local gang named The Gov’ners. From this point began his early professional career, which shone a spotlight on the sobering reality of post-war life in Britain, including the stark landscapes of the industrial North, the increasing unemployment and homelessness levels in the capital, and growing unrest across the country.

In 1964, he returned to Cyprus, where he encountered his first taste of war, covering the violent intercommunal clashes of the Greek and Turkish Cypriots, for which he gained international recognition, receiving a World Press Award for his efforts. For two decades following, war would become the mainstay of his journalistic ventures, initially for The Observer, before taking post with The Sunday Times Magazine from 1966 to 1984, under Editor-in-Chief Harold Evans and Art Editor David King. His assignments included the Vietnam and Biafra Wars, ‘The Troubles’ of Northern Ireland, the Lebanese Civil War, the Belgian Congo, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and the fall of Phnom Penh. In pursuit of his work, he was wounded in Cambodia, fell from a roof in El Salvador, was imprisoned by the Idi Amin regime in Uganda, and contracted cerebral malaria in West Africa. It was during this time he released his most celebrated images, gaining recognition both as a master of black and white photography, and as history’s greatest war photographer.

For the last three decades, Don McCullin has sought to relinquish the burden of what he has witnessed throughout his career, turning to the land around him. In later years, he has returned to the Somerset area where he had been evacuated to as a child during the Blitz, and where he now resides. He often refers to the sweeping rural landscape as his greatest salvation, which he captures in dramatic, painterly representations. At home, McCullin has developed a series of meticulously constructed still lifes that provide a deeper form of escapism, drawing inspiration from the great Flemish and Dutch Renaissance masters.

Since the early 1980s, McCullin has focused his foreign endeavours on more peaceful matters, travelling extensively through Indonesia, India, and Africa, documenting his encounters with places and people lesser known to the Western world. Twenty-five years ago, he embarked on a journey to create a cultural and architectural survey of the remains of the Roman Empire, fascinated by expansive landscapes and ruined cities, to intimate close-ups of delicate stone sculptures. Through photography, McCullin pays tribute to the iconic beauty of their marble perfection, and the turbulence and turmoil they have encountered throughout their very existence.

Don McCullin is the recipient of the University of Oxford’s Bodley Medal: Life and Work award (2025), for his outstanding contribution to photography and journalism. He was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Medal at the London Design Festival (2022). In 2020, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the International Center of Photography in New York. He was knighted in the 2017 New Year Honours, for his lifetime services to photography. He was named Master of Photography at the 2016 Photo London Fair. In 2006, he received the Cornell Capa Award for Lifetime Achievement at the International Center of Photography in New York. In 2003, he received the Royal Photographic Society’s Special 150th Anniversary Medal and Honorary Fellowship (HonFRPS). In 1993, he was the first photojournalist to be honoured with a CBE, for his sustained and significant contribution to photojournalism.

McCullin has been the subject of a number of major retrospectives in institutions worldwide, including Tate Liverpool, UK (2021); Tate Britain, UK (2019); National Gallery, Canada (2013); C/O Berlin Museum, Germany (2009); Rome International Festival, Mercati di Traiano, Italy (2004); Foam, Amsterdam (2002); Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris, France (2001); Centre National de la Photographie, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (1993); Les Rencontres de la Photographie, Arles, France (1992); and the Victoria & Albert Museum, UK (1980). Other important solo presentations include ‘Don McCullin in Rome’, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, Italy (2023); ‘Don McCullin. Stillness of Life’, Hauser & Wirth Somerset, UK (2020); ‘Don McCullin: Southern Frontiers’, Château La Coste, France (2019); ‘Shaped by War’, Imperial War Museum, UK (2011); 'Cold Heaven. Don McCullin on AIDS in Africa', Whitechapel Gallery, UK (2001), United Nations Headquarters, New York, NY (2001); 'Don McCullin: Sleeping With Ghosts', Barbican, UK (1997); and ‘Hearts of Darkness: Photography by Don McCullin’, ICP International Centre of Photography, New York (1981).

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