Posted on Fri, 3 Jun 2011
Dialogue With Abbas: 45 Years In Photography
If you feel this week that life has grabbed you a little more unfairly by the collar, maybe this event at the National Museum Of Singapore is a good eye-opener to attend – to realise that by all shades and definitions, we are lucky that we live, today, safe and blessed, in so many ways.
This morning, I chanced upon a request for a listing for a photographer called Abbas and his exhibition at the National Museum of Singapore entitled 45 Years in Photography followed by a dialogue session with him on Saturday 18 June. Not something that I would normally list till my eyes glanced over the short blurb about his inspiration for the exhibition.
S-21_0144 © the Tuol Sleng Museum of Genocide
His source of inspiration for his latest work entitled The Children of The Lotus is the picture of this little girl who would be no older than I was in 1975. She was described as the “Unidentified Prisoner”, and this picture was taken of her by the Khmer Rouge, just before she joined almost 17,000 others, over a span of 4 years, to be massacred in the notorious Tuol Sleng prison under the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia from 1975 to 79. The Khmer regime took photos of almost all their prisoners before forcing false confessions of espionage activities and then condemning men, women and innocent children like these to starvation, torture and then death. Haunted by this image which he first saw in 2007, and the face of such innocence and childhood, Abbas raises questions about the acceptance of such brutality against human life in a presumably compassionate Buddhist society and shares his personal reflections through his own work on his three year journey among 12 predominantly Buddhist countries including Cambodia.
Abbas was born in Iran in 1944 and later moved to Paris. He has been a member of the prestigious photo agency Magnum since 1981 and has roamed the world for 45 years covering major political and social events, and publishing his works widely in world magazines and newspapers. Through his early photojournalistic and other major works such as the Iranian Revolution and the Islamic world (before and after the September 11 incident), Abbas has shown his dedication to the struggles within different societies in this rapidly globalising world, with an emphasis on religion defined by him as culture rather than faith.
WHERE AND WHEN:
Abbas, 45 Years of Photography: A Dialogue Session with Abbas
Date: Saturday, 18 June, 2011
Time: 7pm – 8:30pm
Admission: Free with purchase of Abbas, 45 Years of Photography exhibition admission ticket. Free seating with limited capacity on a first come first served basis.
Venue: National Museum of Singapore, 93 Stamford Road, Singapore 178897
MRT Station: City Hall, Dhoby Ghaut or Bras Basah
Website: www.nationalmusuem.sg
Contact: 6332 3659 / 6332 5642
