I bought a cool flipbook at a bookstore called Printed Matter. They had a small section of flipbooks I was exploring and they were pretty fun, then I picked up a small, black one that didn’t have any marking on the outside. I flipped it and was shocked. It was a recreation of United Airlines Flight 175 crashing into the south tower of the World Trade Center. Having such a horrific image in a flipbook, a medium that is normally associated with playful kid toys or animation was really powerful. I researched it a bit and it was created by an artist named Scott Blake who makes lots of different and interesting flipbooks. He said that his intention with the book was to comment on the media coverage of the event and how often news outlets played the images of the planes crashing. The book came with an essay on the book and a media study showing how many times each major new source played the video per hour. He thinks that by playing it so many times that they let the group responsible for the attacks achieve what they wanted to do and put fear in the hearts of the citizens. I think that if they didn’t show the images though, that people would have reacted even more negatively that our media didn’t give the attention it deserved for being one of the largest attack on US citizens. No matter how the situation was handeld, it highlights the trust issue between citizens and news sources. In any case, I think it is a powerful piece and I had to buy it, I still get chills every time I flip through it. I like that such a small thing can have such an impact on me and prompt me to write a longer post than anyone will want to read. All of the profits from the book go to the 9/11 Orphans fund, FDNY, and the Red Cross. Here is a short video.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BEmcv6BZKY]-Beaudry Allen