{"id":678700,"date":"2026-09-08T15:01:27","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T15:01:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/678700\/"},"modified":"2026-09-08T15:01:27","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T15:01:27","slug":"experts-claim-gerda-taro-took-the-falling-soldier-not-robert-capa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/678700\/","title":{"rendered":"Experts Claim Gerda Taro Took ‘The Falling Soldier’, Not Robert Capa"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"A<\/p>\n

Robert Capa\u2019s The Falling Soldier photograph has been mired in controversy for decades, dogged by claims that it was staged and that Capa falsified the caption information. Despite this, it remains an iconic image in the pantheon of photojournalism.<\/p>\n

Taken during the Spanish Civil War on September 5, 1936, Capa claimed the photo depicted the moment a Republican soldier was shot in the head by a \u201cfascist bullet\u201d as he charged forward during the Battle of Cerro Muriano. It caused a sensation when it was published in LIFE magazine. <\/p>\n

However, it has been long-established that the photograph wasn\u2019t taken on Cerro Muriano. In 2009, Jos\u00e9 Manuel Susperregui concluded that the photo was taken about 30 miles away near Espejo, where no battle was taking place on the day it was taken. <\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t unusual for photographs to be staged during the Spanish Civil War, a conflict that restricted war photographers\u2019 access to the front. <\/p>\n

Did Gerda Taro Take \u2018The Falling Soldier\u2019? <\/p>\n

These theories have taken decades to come out, but now there\u2019s another one emerging: that Robert Capa didn\u2019t even take the photograph. <\/p>\n

In a recent interview with The Telegraph<\/a>, archeologist and historian Fernando Penco, who is curating an exhibition at the University of C\u00f3rdoba to mark the 90th anniversary of the photograph, says he is \u201cconvinced\u201d that it was Gerda Taro, Capa\u2019s lover and collaborator, who took the photo.<\/p>\n

\"\"Gerda Taro in July 1937. <\/p>\n

Penco points to the International Center of Photography in New York, which holds the Capa Archive, and revealed last year that The Falling Soldier was made on a medium-format 6\u00d76 camera. <\/p>\n

On that particular day, Capa shot with a 35mm Leica, while Taro shot with a Reflex Korelle 6\u00d76 camera. Penco says he has even found photographs of Taro holding her Reflex Korelle on the same day the photo was taken. <\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, everything hinged on one premise,\u201d Penco tells The Telegraph. \u201cIf the photo was taken with the Reflex Korelle, we would have to seriously reconsider whether Taro took it.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the negative for The Falling Soldier has never been found, Penco says all other square-format photos that exist from Espejo that day have been attributed to Taro. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have found photographs taken by Capa with Taro holding her Reflex Korelle earlier that day in Villa del R\u00edo, from where they headed off to the front. Taken together, I think this is strong proof that it was she who took The Falling Soldier,\u201d says Penco. <\/p>\n

Taro and Capa worked closely together after meeting in Paris in 1935. In fact, Robert Capa was initially a fictional photographer invented by the two Jewish immigrants fleeing the Nazis. The pair wanted a more American-sounding name so they could sell into the lucrative U.S. market. Eventually, Capa, who was born Endre Friedmann, fully assumed the name Capa, while Taro, who was born Gerta Pohorylle, adopted Gerda Taro. <\/p>\n

Last week, a movie about Taro<\/a> premiered at the Venice Film Festival. Taro died while covering the Spanish Civil War; she is believed to be the first female photojournalist killed while covering war. <\/p>\n

Affiliate Disclosure PetaPixel articles may include affiliate links; we may earn a commission if you buy through one. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Robert Capa\u2019s The Falling Soldier photograph has been mired in controversy for decades, dogged by claims that it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678701,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[267],"tags":[365,362,363,364,366,18,117,19,17],"class_list":["post-678700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117236026733213791","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678700\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}