Hallie Ford Museum of Art Features Vietnam War Photo Exhibition

It is the first Pacific Northwest appearance for this international touring exhibition.

Larry Burrows (British, 1926–1971), “South of the DMZ, Vietnam,” 1966, collection of the George Eastman House/International Museum of Photography and Film, Rochester, N.Y.

(SALEM, Ore.) - Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina will be on display August 15th through November 8th at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University — the first time this internationally touring exhibition has made an appearance in the Pacific Northwest.

Photojournalists Horst Faas and Tim Page organized the exhibition, which includes 160 photographs from the collection of the George Eastman House/International Museum of Photography and Film in Rochester, N.Y.

Requiem honors the 135 photographers who died in Vietnam between 1945 and 1975, including Robert Capa, Larry Burrows and Henri Huet.

The exhibition traces the history of the Vietnam War from the early 1950s to the fall of Saigon in 1975, and brings together photojournalists from both sides of the conflict: Americans, Europeans, Asians and North and South Vietnamese.

In a New York Times interview, Page remembered having the vision for the collection while searching out the fate of his photo buddies (one was Sean Flynn, son of actor Errol Flynn) and their photographs in Vietnam.

While traveling down the Mekong River at sunset, Page had what he called “that one pure thought” of a lifetime: to memorialize the photographers who lost their lives.

The photographs are among the thousands gathered by Faas and Page, both of whom were wounded in Vietnam. Together they decided the works of famous photojournalists would hang alongside those of unknown photographers.

The power of the exhibition lies not only in the extraordinary pictures these brave and daring photographers took, but in the viewer’s knowledge that the man or woman behind the lens would die, in some cases within minutes of capturing the picture.

At the same time, the exhibition offers a powerful and gripping portrait of one of America’s longest and most politically divisive wars.

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.

Other photos: Gilles Caron (French, 1939–1970), “A Shau Valley, Vietnam,” 1967, and Kyoichi Sawada's (Japanese, 1936–1970), “Qui Nhon, Vietnam,” 1965, collection of the George Eastman House/International Museum of Photography and Film, Rochester, N.Y.