The main character debates this point with himself and with the victim of one of his war photos in the book. It's an interesting philosophical discussion. The subject of the photo (The Face of Defeat) was a Croatian (this was during the Bosnian war) and because the photograph went around the world, the man suffered greatly in the aftermath. He was tortured, his family brutalized and murdered. It's an interesting book by one of my favorite authors (he also wrote The Club Dumas, among others).
Not sure I get the context of the discussion vis a vis photography vs painting. Photography is more immediate surely so his likeness would be distributed more widely via newspaper than if his portrait had been painted, photographed, and then distributed the same way. Also, in paintings, most of the subjects are posing and or more likely not in fact be the "originals" --eg in a war picture.
The photographer decides after a lifetime of taking pictures of war that the only way for him to tell the truth about war is through a painting. He moves into an aged watchtower and uses the circular inner walls as his canvas for a panoramic mural that distills his understanding of war. It covers millennia of images from Troy to the present.
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Photography is more immediate surely so his likeness would be distributed more widely via newspaper than if his portrait had been painted, photographed, and then distributed the same way. Also, in paintings, most of the subjects are posing and or more likely not in fact be the "originals" --eg in a war picture.
I loved The Club Dumas.
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