Paris in the summer of 1937. A giant funeral processionwends its way from the city center
eastwardtoward the Père-Lachaise Cemetery accompaniedby the sounds of Chopin's funeralmarch.
The photojournalist Gerda Taro had beenkilled in the Spanish Civil War a few days
earlier.Thousands come to pay their last respects to theémigrée from Hitler's Germany. The poet
LouisAragon speaks at the graveside young girls holdup a large portrait of the deceased. Why
did theFrench Communist Party honor a foreigner - onewho was not even a member of the Party -
witha first-class burial?Ernest Hemingway is said to have found GerdaTaro while searching for
better Germans the term he used to describe Germans fightingon the Republican side in the
Spanish Civil War.Taro is today considered one of the path-breakingpioneers of photography. She
captured someof the most dramatic and widely published imagesof the Spanish Civil War and was
the firstfemale photographer to shoot images in themidst of battle. Her willingness to work
close tothe fighting set new standards for war photographyand ultimately cost her her life.
Taro standsalongside early twentieth century war photographerslike Robert Capa and David Chim
Seymour.Her death the first fatality during war coverage garnered worldwide attention. She
hadbroken new ground as a woman and as a photographer.Despite this Gerda Taro has largely
fallen intooblivion especially in comparison to her colleagueand partner Robert Capa. Whether
genderand religion played a role in this would requirea separate investigation. In any case in
herstudy of women resisting fascism Ingrid Stroblreaches the conclusion that a combination
suchas woman-Communist-Jew represented a threefoldstigma and would almost guarantee
Taro'sexclusion from official history both in the Eastand the West.It has been almost twenty
years since the firstbiography of Gerda Taro written by Irme Schaber led to Taro's rediscovery
as a photographer.Since that time the discovery of the MexicanSuitcase containing more than
800 of her photos has made new research on Taro possible.In this new fully revised biography
Irme Schaberpresents groundbreaking insights regardingcameras copyrights and the circumstances
surroundingTaro's death.
