Saturday in Beacon, NY

A highlight of my short-term stay in Brooklyn, for sure.....my roommate Carla Hoade and I headed to this small tourist town on the Hudson River, about 2hrs north of Manhattan...checked out an awesome exhibit at Beacon Gallery hosted by Fovea Exhibitions entitled "It Is Our War"...begun with a heated panel discussion concerning war images in the media and how we receive them...moderated by Jamie Wellford, Newsweek's international photo editor....panel also included a West Point grad, who had served in Iraq, and the photographers whose work was featured: New York Times photographer Todd Heisler, who was awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography for "Final Salute"...Chris Hondros, recipient of the Robert Capa Gold Medal, war photography's highest honor, for his work in Iraq..also staff photographer for Getty Images.....and Suzanne Opton, a widely published photographer with work in the collections of the Bibliotheque Nationale de France and the Musee de L'Elysee..she also teaches at the International Center of Photography and Cooper Union in NYC......great stuff...all images having heavy impact, conveying stories of loss from both sides of the war in Iraq.

Following the discussion and exhibit we grabbed a bite to eat and then came back to a grassy field across the street from the gallery..once the sun went down we viewed accomplished photojournalist's stories projected onto the side of a building, accompanied by music...all presented by seen/unseen......photo essay by Stanley Greene entitled "Chalk Lines", Q. Sakamaki's "Rio Favela: Survival" and "Sri Lanka: War without End", Farah Nosh's "Wounded Iraq", Jake Price's "Silent Exile", Lorena Ros's "Human Trafficking", Moises Saman's "Elections in Haiti" and "La Vida por Las Maras", and Alan Chin's "Hurricane Katrina, Renaissance Village, and New Orleans"......it was fantastic work, all of it, though Q. Sakamaki's series resonated with me the most....due to the striking contrast within the images, creating graphic shapes, revealing drama.....emphasizing the injustices at hand..the extreme violence in the Rio's Favelas, or slums, to the 24-year civil war between the government and Tamil Tiger rebels in Sri Lanka.

Afterwards at a cool little restaurant/bar called Tonique I introduced myself to Jamie, Newsweek's photo editor, and gave him a calendar from my Vietnam show as well as Stanley Green, who covered the Vietnam War, not only from the American side but also from the perspective of the Viet Cong, amazing!

After leaving the bar Alan Chin, a friend of Carla's, took us to Stephanie's (fovea board member) house where most of the photographers were....there was Chinese food, a mix of beverages, and lots of stories being told....we stayed till 2am before driving back to brooklyn...it was a good one.

Regeneration

First of all I'd like to thank everyone who came out on Veterans Day, November 11th to the LG Gallery for their support in making the first "Vietnam: more than war" exhibition such a successful event. Ticket sales were high along with calendars, t-shirts, and prints. We raised a fair amount of money for the Tran Family and the Vietnam Relief Effort, but this is still a work in progress. The t-shirts, 2007 calendars, and limited edition prints are now available on this site, get them while you can!

Some of the large format scrolls have been on display at Salsa's, downtown Asheville, check them out if you haven't already. We are currently putting together a media packet to entice other galleries across the US to host the exhibition. Also, we will be adding video from the show on our website, so check back soon!

ps - The t-shirt that i'm wearing in the photo above is from AHN OI, a great resource for Vietnam inspired clothing.