Saturday 18 July 2015

These Stunning Nude Photographs of Injured Soldiers Will Change How You Look at Disability


INJURED BUT NOT BROKEN


Injured, but not broken (Picture: Michael Stokes)

These Stunning Nude Photographs of Injured Soldiers Will Change How You Look at Disability

By Siam Goorwich 


Amazing pictures of amazing men


It’s easy to think of injured soldiers as broken men, but as these powerful images show, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Photographer Michael Stokes specialises in striking male nudes, and when he turned his lens on injured vets, something truly special happened.

The resulting images – of around 14 wounded United States army, navy and marine veterans of the Gulf Wars – are bold, striking and incredibly sexy.

And now, thanks to an incredibly successful Kickstarter campaign (which saw Stokes reach his $48,000 target in just one hour), these images are to form a book called ‘Always Loyal’.



Retired US Marine, Chris Van Etten (Picture: Michael Stokes)



On his Kickstarter page, Stokes explains: ‘Each veteran will have a bio page and details related to his or her injuries.’

He goes on: ‘The vast majority of these veterans have lost one or multiple limbs from IED attacks.’



Taylor at Salton Sea (Picture: Michael Stokes)



He also explains that there are two covers for the book. The main cover (above), and a ‘controversial’ alternate cover (below) which depicts a Christ-like image of a veteran hanging from ropes.



Taylor with ropes (Picture: Michael Stokes)


Talking to MTV, Stokes explained: ‘Some people will say to me “Oh, this is really helpful to their self-esteem,” or, “You’re making them feel like men again,”‘

He went on: ‘the response I have to that is that these guys have come to me very healed and ready to take the world on. I’m not giving them back their confidence. They already have it.




US army sergeant Bryan Anderson (Picture: Michael Stokes)




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