Stéphanie Borcard and Nicolas Métraux February 13, 2012
Posted by Geoffrey Hiller in Vietnam.Tags: Vietnam
comments closed
The Reunification Express. Vietnam 2011
BM-photo is the result of a collaborative work between Stéphanie Borcard and Nicolas Métraux (both of them Swiss and born in 1978) living for the past year in Asian hotel rooms. We work on personal projects, developing calm and poetic images. Through our recent series of photographs, we try to create a set of emotions, rather than to document a specific subject. Human interactions have always been our source of inspiration. We used to get very close to people but now, we appreciate a certain distance. Before coming to photography, Stephanie was a teacher and Nicolas a woodworker and an architect. We are collaborating with swissinfo.ch, a Swiss broadcasting agency and with CIAN Agency. We always work together and co-sign all our images
About the Photograph:
“The Reunification Express was built by the French in 1936, destroyed during the war and rebuilt in 1976, its tracks link Hanoi to Saigon. It is one of the slowest express trains in the world. We like its slow pace and its name. It evokes both a sad past and a present peace. As the train approaches, the tiny crowd starts to move. The small train station is, for a while filled with life. Our journey begins in Hanoi. We sit on a wooden bench aboard the Reunification Express. A hard-seat-and-fan ticket to South. People sleep all over the train trying to escape the heat. The air is thick. Our eyes wander there, outside on the landscape; what happened here? We were born after the war. It did not concern us, yet it was almost all we knew about Vietnam. How does this land look like today? Who are the Vietnamese? This is our travel journal. The destination is not important; it is the way covered that is.”
David Dare Parker April 25, 2011
Posted by Geoffrey Hiller in Vietnam.Tags: Vietnam
comments closed
Pham Minh Trieu and his Daughter, Pham Thi Ngoc Vietnam 2010
David Dare Parker (b. 1958, Australia) was one of the original co-founders of Reportage and was a Director of FotoFreo Photographic Festival (Australia). His photographs have been published in: Le Monde, Stern, L’Express, Focus, Australian Geographic, The Bulletin, The New York Times, Fortune and Time Australia. David’s recent projects include coverage of East Timor’s struggle to gain independence and Indonesia’s first steps towards democracy. In January 2002 he was asked to co-ordinate a safety awareness course for Afghan Journalists in Peshawar, Pakistan for the International Federation of Journalists. David is a Walkley Award winning photographer and an ambassador for Nikon Australia. He is represented by SOUTH in Australia and On Asia Images in Asia.
About the Photograph:
“It was moving to watch the affection between Pham Minh Trieu and his daughter, Pham Thi Ngoc Minh, 33 years old. This quietly spoken man had been in the Army from 1950 till 1975 and was a medic during the Vietnam War. He remembers hiding in underground tunnels during US Air Force bombing raids. He was based in Baria, Vung Tau, when dioxin was dropped on the area and has strong memories of leaves falling off plants, trees dying and eating fruit from dioxin-affected regrowth. Returning to Ben Tre Provence he married and had a daughter. He blames her defects on dioxin poisoning, a direct result of his exposure during the War. Testing for dioxin in the body is expensive, at around $1,500 per test it is cost prohibitive to most Vietnamese families. Without such tests, there can be no conclusive evidence dioxin was the cause of the defects, offering little chance for compensation, or help, outside of that provided by the Vietnamese Government.”
Justin Maxon April 13, 2008
Posted by Geoffrey Hiller in Vietnam.Tags: Agent Orange, Justin Maxon, Vietnam
comments closed
Agent Orange Victim, Vietnam
Justin Maxon, (b. 1983) is finishing his degree at San Francisco State University. He is interested in pursuing documentary projects that focus on the issues of poverty and social injustice. He discovered his passion for documentary photography while working on a project in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District, a neighborhood notorious for its poverty and homeless epidemic. Justin’s awards include first prize from World Press Photo and College Photographer of the Year (2007). He is represented by Aurora Photos.
About the Photograph:
During the Vietnam War, the United States sprayed an estimated 17 million gallons of chemicals on Vietnam. As a result, since the war ended, 1.5 million Vietnamese people are believed to be victims of Agent Orange poisoning, with many of them living in extreme pain and isolation with debilitating symptoms. Those who are significantly affected are in need of constant care. Their lives are a brutal example of the misery that war creates even decades after it occurs.
Kevin German March 15, 2008
Posted by Geoffrey Hiller in Vietnam.Tags: Documentary Photography, Vietnam
1 comment so far
Vietnam, Kevin German
Former Sacramento Bee staff photographer Kevin German is off to Vietnam again. As is evident from looking at his site this young photographer shows exceptional promise. I especially liked his photo-essays about the truck stop in Sacramento and his time spent with Ben Underwood from the series “Echo’s in the Dark”.
