Posted by vrcvanderbilt on Friday, September 14, 2018 in Events, HART, Lectures, News, Vanderbilt University, VRC.

Vivien Fryd, professor of history of art, will deliver a paper, “Henry Ries’ Iconic Photograph of the Berlin Airlift,” on October 18 at the Smithsonian Archives of American Art, Washington, DC. The seminar is sponsored by the Archives, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

The iconic photographs of Henry Ries (1917-2004), a celebrated photojournalist for the New York Times (1947-1955), especially in Germany, documented the destruction of Berlin after WWII and the Berlin Blockade and Airlift (1947-1949). His most iconic photograph, Landing of the Candy Bombers at Tempelhof Airport (1948), can be found on post cards sold in various Berlin museums and tourist destinations (i.e., the TV Tower, Holocaust Museum, and Museum Berggruen), on the U.S. Commemorative Postage Stamp in 1998 to honor the 50th anniversary of the Berlin Blockade, and on Wikipedia under “Berlin Blockade.”

The photograph also formed the basis of a variety of exhibitions in Berlin and the United States between 1948 and 2008, including the Library of Congress, the New York Public Library, the Goethe Haus in New York City, the Willy-Brandt Haus in Berlin, the Berlinische Galerie in Berlin, and the German Historical Museum in Berlin. It was on display in an exhibition held in 2003 in conjunction with the German government awarding Ries the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit, the highest award for citizens of other countries.

“This paper will argue that the photograph, taken by this transatlantic photojournalist who is my uncle, signifies not only hope but also the transformation of the U.S. from an enemy to a friend, indeed a rescuer in the midst of what marks the end of WWII, the beginning of the Cold War, and the resultant division between East and West Berlin,” said Fryd.