Gun Nation
In the 18 years since Zed Nelson’s seminal photography book Gun Nation was published, 500,000 Americans have been killed by firearms in the USA. Half a million people dead - and many more injured. Nelson returns to the people he met, photographs them, and asks why they think this is happening.
Avoiding stereotypical images of gang members or extremists, Nelson focuses instead on another side to America’s gun culture: the mainly white, middle-class Americans who sell and purchase guns in vast numbers, fuelling the nation’s insatiable appetite for firearms.
Nelson’s two-decade-long rapport with his photographic subjects gives unique and intimate access to the minds of American gun owners and seeks to understand why – despite the enormous death toll – there is such fierce resistance to gun control laws in the USA.
Gun Nation is commissioned as part of the Guardian Bertha documentary partnership, which aims to tell international stories with global impact.
Film-maker portrait: Zed Nelson
Zed Nelson is an award-winning photographer and film-maker based in London whose work is published and exhibited internationally.
He spent four weeks in the USA visiting his original photo subjects and others affected by guns. Instead of the usual pictures of violence and victims, Nelson takes us on a revealing and disquieting journey, engaging with the reasons behind gun owners’ resistance to change and looking for a way forward.
Accompanying the film, Guardian Weekend magazine will be publishing a major photo article on 24 September, including past and present work by Nelson.
Guns in America
Gun Nation is part of a week-long focus on guns in the USA which also include the serialisation of Gary Younge’s book Another Day in the Death of America and a series of major new articles by Guardian US on super owners who own an average of 17 guns. This follows recent major projects by the Guardian on gun control in the US including data on every recent US mass shooting and Lois Beckett’s writing on gun policy including a long read on whether gun rights supporters are sometimes right
Participate
Guardian Witness want your experiences of what made you change your mind about guns. They’re looking for stories from people who have crossed from one side of the gun debate to the other. Was there a moment that convinced you to become a gun owner for the first time? A moment that made you question your gun ownership? Or simply a moment, or a conversation, that transformed your understanding of the role of gun ownership in America?
Coming up: Desert Fire
They are the countries that do not exist, the peoples of no nation. In the summer of 2016, an extraordinary tournament took place: the ‘rebel’ World Cup. Our next film documents this surreal and vibrant spectacle through the most fascinating team of the lot: Kurdistan. Out Friday 14 October - watch the trailer here.
Guardian Live documentary screenings
Bugs - Wednesday 28 September 2016, 6.30pm, Bertha Dochouse, London
Insects as food is a hot topic. Particularly over the last few years, since the UN recommended edible insects as a resource to combat world hunger, they have been heralded for their taste by cooks and gastronomes, for their low ecological impact by environmentalists, and for their nutritional content by public health scientists. It would seem that insects are the new superfood that will fix all our problems of global food security. Watch the trailer
Got a documentary idea?
Our documentaries are commissioned from independent film-makers with access to great stories. If you have a short documentary idea that could work for us email charlie.phillips@theguardian.com with a one-page proposal and a clip or teaser.
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