Precautionary public service messages are often so gruesome or ham-fisted that the public tunes out the message. Diego Levy, 37, an Argentine photographer, was trying to pierce the general indifference toward the high number of car crashes in Buenos Aires.
To induce people to look at such images in the first place, Mr. Levy set out to photograph wrecked vehicles as if they were “a species of sculptures on the streets.” For about two years, beginning in 2006, he would wake up in the morning to listen to news of recent crashes and jump in his car to capture the damage before it was hauled away.
“They appear staged, as if someone had put an ambulance standing up in the middle of the highway,” Mr. Levy said. “That makes it look as if they have a content that is comical. But that wasn’t the intention.”
Instead, “Crashes” (“Choques”) seeks to underscore the premise that these accidents were avoidable, not inevitable; often the products of recklessness, rudeness or a violent streak in the larger culture. “People look at them and wonder why there are so many accidents, why so many people die,” Mr. Levy said. “I think it’s a good way to enter into a question that is so painful.”
“I don’t wish to change the world,” he said. “It’s impossible. But I do intend to try to change certain way of conduct.”
Diego Levy
