Peter van Agtmael Receives the 2012 W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography

At 24—the same age as many of the soldiers he would go on to document—van Agtmael began the project during an embed with American troops engaged in heavy fighting around Mosul, Iraq. “As an American of the generation shouldering these wars, I feel a strong responsibility to document their cost,” says the photographer, whose lens captured everything from violent firefights and days-long foot patrols to the rehabilitation of those maimed by war. ”Over the course of my lifetime, I intend to keep returning to [these conflicts] to create a comprehensive document.”