A collection of old mortar shells made from the ruins of Cassino, Italy 1948

This silver gelatin print by David Seymour captures a stark scene in Cassino, Italy. The composition is dominated by the monochrome tones of the war-ravaged landscape, where rubble and detritus fill the frame, creating a chaotic visual texture. Amidst this ruin, the artist directs our eye toward the children, who are centrally positioned in the foreground. Seymour masterfully employs a semiotic language, juxtaposing the symbols of destruction and innocence. The abandoned mortar shells—instruments of conflict—are arranged almost playfully by the children, pointing to a disruption of conventional symbolic meanings. The arrangement of the shells, echoing the jagged lines of the bombed-out buildings, suggests an unintentional aestheticization of war’s aftermath, prompting a critique of how we assign value and interpret the visual relics of violence. In this image, the form and content merge to challenge fixed narratives around war. Seymour invites us to deconstruct and question our understanding, presenting a landscape where the lines between ruin and play, victim and survivor, are unsettlingly blurred.