Picture Mourning
The Work of Eight Photographers
Bruce Davidson
Wendy Ewald
John Fago
Paul Fusco
Eric Gottesman
Michael Hintlian
Susan Meiselas
Fazal Sheikh
September 11 - October 14, 2006
Main Gallery, John Hope Franklin Center
Opening Reception
Monday, September 11, 2006
6:00 - 7:30 PM :: Franklin Center Gallery
Reflections on Mourning
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
12:00 - 1:00 PM :: Room 240, Franklin Center
"Picture Mourning: photography as companion in public & private remembrance"
By Rob Sikorski, Exhibit Curator
Picture mourning began with a single photograph, one with which I am intimately familiar: Wendy Ewald's "Freddy Childers, Self Portrait with picture of my biggest brother, Everett, who killed himself when he came back from Vietnam."
The touching photograph is simple, with near perfect symmetry. Freddy Childers stands in the middle of the frame, holding his brother's photograph just about waist high.
Perhaps the picture of Everett is a school photograph; perhaps it's one taken at a department store. Either way, it's a professional photograph. Everett's photograph was taken when he was six, just about the age of Freddy at the time of Childer's / Ewald's photograph.
Over the years, I've returned to this image, wondering why it draws me back.
Somewhere in Freddy's photograph is the narrative of my relationship to photographs in my own life. It taunts me with questions and draws to the surface two photographs. These are not in the show but are among the most cherished photographs I possess.
For more information on this and other exhibits at the Franklin Center, contact Pamela Gutlon, p.gutlon@duke.edu.