Josef Koudelka: Invasion Prague 68
Now available in a hardcover format, Invasion Prague 68 reinstates the vitality and prescience of Koudelka’s work in capturing public defiance in the face of political suppression
When Soviet-led troops invaded Czechoslovakia in August 1968, ending the short-lived Prague Spring, Josef Koudelka was one of the first on the scene. As an acclaimed theater photographer, Koudelka (born in Moravia, Czech Republic, 1938) knew nothing about photojournalism, but that would soon change. In the turmoil of the invasion, he took a series of photographs purely for himself, which were miraculously smuggled out of the country. A year after they reached New York, Magnum Photos distributed and credited the photos to an unknown Czech photographer. Their significance earned the still-anonymous photographer the Robert Capa Award. Sixteen years would pass before Koudelka could safely acknowledge authorship.
This hardcover edition of Invasion Prague 68 contains 250 images selected by Koudelka from his archive, punctuated by contemporary broadcasts and eye-witness accounts. Almost sixty years later, these searing photographs return to light, standing as a timely reminder of the brutality of political repression and the importance of bearing witness to injustice.