The final day of my From Above exhibition at the Nagasaki National Peace Memorial Hall for Atomic Bomb Victims. It was an honor to have been asked by the Peace Hall to participate in the Nagasaki Peace Film Forum and to have met with many of the hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors) I’ve photographed in the past.
Thank you to everyone who attended and to the many people who helped make this possible throughout the eight years of the project. Without them there would not be an exhibition or project.
From Above exhibition at the Nagasaki National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims is a part of 2016 Nagasaki International Peace Film Forum. The exhibition runs through December 25th.
The project hasn’t been exhibited in Nagasaki for two years so there are plenty of new portraits that are being shown for the first time in Japan.
From Above will be exhibited at the Nagasaki National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims as a part of 2016 Nagasaki International Peace Film Forum. The opening is on December 10th and the exhibition runs through December 25th.
The project hasn’t been exhibited in Nagasaki for two years so there are plenty of new portraits that will be shown for the first time in Japan.
This is the link to Thursday night’s interview about From Above on The John Batchelor Show on WABC Radio. We cover some of my journey to Hiroshima and Nagasaki photographing atomic bomb survivors (hibakusha) and the upcoming exhibition at the Nagasaki Peace Memorial Hall opening in December.
A huge thank you to Mr. Batchelor for having me on the show for the third to speak about From Above. The John Batchelor show is the highest rated radio show in New York at the 9pm time slot. Honored again to be asked back to the show!
“We cannot listen to the voices that vanished near the hypocenter.
No matter how many testimonies I gather, a blank will remain.”
-Masahito Hirose
Today I received the sad news that Mr. Masahito Hirose passed away, two months before his 86th birthday. I photographed Mr. Hirose on my second trip to Nagasaki. He was 15 years old when the atomic bomb destroyed the city. He didn’t sustain any external injuries from the blast but suffered from cancer.
After the H-Bomb test on Bikini Atoll in 1954, Mr. Hirose devoted his life to collecting the testimonies of other hibaksuha (atomic bomb survivors). While recording the stories it allowed him to confront his own tragic experiences.
Mr. Hirose spoke fluent English so he was one of the few hibakusha I was able to speak with directly. His language skills were important because he was one of the first to translate the hibakusha’s testimony into English. When I first read about him I immiediately asked if I could meet him. I have always been grateful for his honesty and time.
