Lectures and Films Planned in Conjunction with Vietnam War Photo Exhibition

A rare opportunity for Oregonians.

Requiem 4: Larry Burrows (British, 1926–1971), “Near Khe Sanh, Vietnam,” 1966, collection of the George Eastman House/International Museum of Photography and Film, Rochester, N.Y.

(SALEM, Ore.) - The Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University has planned a variety of free lectures and films for September in conjunction with the exhibition Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina, on display August 15 through November 8.

The exhibition features 160 photographs from the collection of the George Eastman House/International Museum of Photography and Film in Rochester, N.Y., taken by photographers who died in Vietnam between 1945 and 1975.

Thursday, September 3, 7:00 p.m., Paulus Lecture Hall, Willamette University College of Law: Keith Davis, curator of photography at the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City and one of the foremost photo historians in the U.S., will lecture on the history of war photography over the past two centuries, from Matthew Brady’s photographs of the Civil War through World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the current Iraq War.

For 28 years, Davis was director of the Hallmark Photography Collection, where he transformed the collection into a premier photography repository.

He has organized dozens of photography exhibitions and is the author of several books and articles on the history of photography, including The Origins of American Photography and An American Century of Photography.

Friday, September 11, 5:00 p.m., Paulus Lecture Hall, Willamette University College of Law: Richard Pyle, an Associated Press writer based in New York, will discuss some of the key photographers in the exhibition whom he worked with in Vietnam in the late 1960s and early 1970s, including Larry Burrows, Henri Huet, Sean Flynn and Dana Stone. His lecture will be less of a history of Vietnam photography and more of a remembrance of some of the remarkable photojournalists who contributed significant pictures of the Vietnam War before losing their lives.

Pyle covered the Vietnam War as a reporter for nearly five years beginning in 1968 and was AP’s Saigon bureau chief from 1970 to 1973. He and Horst Faas, former AP Saigon photo editor and co-organizer of the exhibition, are co-authors of Lost Over Laos, a book that recounts the death of Larry Burrows, Henri Huet, Kent Potter and Keisaburo Shimamoto in a helicopter crash over Laos in 1971, the subsequent search for the crash site, and Faas and Pyle’s journey to the Laos jungle 27 years later.

Thursdays, September 17 and 24, 7:00 p.m., Roger Hull Lecture Hall, Hallie Ford Museum of Art: The museum will screen a two-part film series, Reporting America at War, which explores the role of American journalists in the pivotal conflicts of the 20th century and beyond. From San Juan Hill to the beaches of Normandy, and from the jungles of Vietnam to the Persian Gulf, this documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Stephen Ives tells the dramatic and often surprising stories of the reporters who witnessed and wrote the news from the battlefield.

Episode 1, The Romance of War, will be shown September 17, and episode 2, Which Side Are You On?, will be shown September 24. “War correspondents are mythic figures that have captured the American imagination,” Ives said, “and the history of their exploits offers a revealing glimpse at the nature of democracy.”

Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina has been supported in part by grants from the City of Salem’s Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art is located at 700 State St. (corner of State and Cottage streets) in downtown Salem near the campus of Willamette University. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sunday from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

The galleries are closed Monday. Admission is $3 for adults and $2 for seniors and students. Children younger than 12 are admitted free, and Tuesday is an admission-free day. For more information, call (503) 370-6855.