An eclectic collection of images focused on the concept of 'peace' and taken by some of Australiaís best photojournalists will be exhibited at Victoriaís Monash Gallery of Art from February 16 to April 28.
Iconic Australian actor Jack Thompson, AM, will open MGA's upcoming exhibition titled PEACE on Saturday, February 16. The gallery curators say this important exhibition of photographs "seeks to find a picture of 'peace' and includes photographs made by prominent photographers from the Australian photographic collective Degree South." These include Tim Page, Ashley Gilbertson, Stephen Dupont, Ben Bohane, Michael Coyne, Jack Picone and the late Sean Flynn.
War imagery has been a staple of photography since photographs were first made. Many of the world's most famous photographs illustrate it. Peace seems more difficult to represent. Is peace merely the absence of war? How to make it more than fleeting? These are the kind of questions asked by those who have witnessed war and have come to feel deeply about the possibilities of peace. The Degree South collective of Australian photographers have spent much of their lives documenting conflicts around the world. Now they want to show images of peace they picked up along the way, and which they hope can resonate as powerfully as the pictures they have made of actual conflict.
The organisers say this exhibition is timed to remind people of the absence of peace in contemporary life. The exhibition will mark the 10th anniversary of the Coalition's invasion of Iraq (March 18, 2003). Jack Thompson will discuss his own peace-making experiences when, as the UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador in the 1990s, he made a documentary film about the lives of Cambodian children displaced by the Khmer Rouge. With the late photographer Peter Carrette (a close friend), Thompson helped establish a child protection agency called "Krousar Thmey" ("new family" in Khmer) which enabled the lost children of "Site II" (the largest refugee camp in the world at the time) to return to their homeland of Cambodia.
The exhibition is supported by Fujifilm Professional.
Woman in Burqa: Shamsatoo Afghan Refugee Camp, Peshawar, Pakistan 2001. Photo by Stephen Dupont.
A man prays at a religious service in Soweto South Africa. Photo by Michael Coyne.
Occupy Wall Street demonstrator 2011. Photo by Ashley Gilbertson.
The enlightening of a Buddha Rupa in Central Colombo, Sri Lanka, Lotus Road, Vihara 5:42am 1983. Photo by Tim Page.
Golden Horse Monastery: novices monks bathe their horses on the Thai-Burma Border 2005. Photo by Jack Picone.
