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In the book "The Bang-Bang Club : Snapshots from a
Hidden War", there is no a full/real version of the history, Kevin appears
to change it as the questions starting to annoying him as he have to fight
back the criticism.
Here is one part of the book that talk about it, I
don't know if it ok to publish it, it just a extract, I have it but in
portuguese.
"During that time, Nancy Lee again asked him about
the picture. He talked about how he had worked the situation, walked all around
the child, working the scene from different angles. What he had really wanted
was for that bird to flap its wings, he said. He was describing it to her in a
macho way - all Nancy could think was it was the kind of situation where most
people would snap a few pictures but then see what they could do for the
child.
?There was something cold in the calculated way in
which he was waiting for the bird?s wings to flap, for heaven?s sake,? Nancy Lee
said. ?I was a little surprised by that, but as time went on, I heard him
telling the story to other people. It metamorphosed into: he took the picture
and sat down under a tree and cried, and that he felt he could not go back to
that feeding-centre. He had just come from there and everyone was screaming in
hunger and there was nothing he could do to help them and he just could not even
bear to take her there. But he was sure she made it to the feeding-centre
because he could not hear the screams of hunger any more.? It was an illogical
explanation, but Kevin was trying to find a story that he felt comfortable in
telling, that was comfortable to hear.
The first version of the story which Joao had heard
from Kevin - in Sudan just minutes after he had taken the picture - did indeed
mention that he had chased the vulture away. But he had not mentioned the child
getting up and walking towards the feeding-centre. He had sat under a tree and
wept. Joao remembered how he mentioned Megan and that all he could think of was
holding her. Kevin had told a little more to his friend and confidant, Reedwaan,
immediately on his return from Sudan, except to Reedwaan he said that, while he
was framing and shooting the picture, the thought was going through his mind,
?Should I chase the bird away?? One part of him said chase it away, but another
said, ?Just shoot, you?re here to work.? He told Reedwaan that he did try to
shoo the bird away after he had finished taking pictures, but that it wouldn?t
go far away and he just couldn?t deal with it, so he walked away and started
crying.
It was only really once the questions began that
Kevin elaborated on the incident. In response to readers? letters to The New
York Times, Kevin told the editors, ?that she recovered enough to resume her
trek after the vulture was chased away?. That was fourteen months before he was
to collect the prize in New York.
In an interview with American Photo Magazine, Kevin
said that he had come upon the chilling scene after wandering alone for two days
in the desert, ?freaked out and sunburnt?, as he attempted to cope with the
tragic situation he had been covering. ?There were hundreds of children starving
like that and worse, you just meander from one horror to the next.? In answer to
what he did after taking the picture, he said, ?I walked away, damnit!? still
upset by ?the horrible pornography? of the death and destruction he had
witnessed.
But whatever Kevin felt he had to say to combat
criticism about his not helping the child, I - and some of his friends - felt
that the picture was something that he had done which he hoped would be free of
the negative sides of his personality and character. It was an escape from his
perception of himself as a failure. It was a pure moment when he shone, a moment
of perfection. But the picture was not free of him - the questions were always
there, and it gnawed at him. Kevin stated, in American Photo, ?This is my most
successful image after ten years of taking pictures, but I do not want to hang
it on my wall. I hate it.? "
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