Robert Capa

Robert Capa was the son of middle class Jewish parents, he was born Endre Friedmann in Budapest in what was then Austro-Hungary. He grew up under the dictatorship of Regent Nicholas Horthy but accepted the ideas of his role models, artist Lajos Kassák. Kassák's anti-authoritarian, anti-fascist, pro-labor, and pacifist beliefs influenced Capa and the rest of his life. At age 18 Capa was arrested by the secret police …

…him unless they somehow expressed the human element, as for instance his photo of an airplane propeller used as a German pilot's tombstone. He was impassioned, and therefore his photos always had a certain bias, but it was a humane bias. He hated war, never glorified it, and never saw himself as heroic. Despite his saying, "If your photos aren't good enough, you aren't close enough," he never took chances unless the photo demanded it.