Can you name this photograph

[schumionbike]

A very famous photograph from the country of its origin. Can you name it? Or at least recognize it or seen it before? It's old photograph, from the 60's I'm not sure if there is still any copyright left, so I'm gonna post here. This is not my photo!

http://tambut.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/nnhanh_tiecthuong.jpg

 

[tomjacob]

Hey,

Its a nice photograph.I did like it.Who took this photo?Thanks for sharing the photograph.Do share such old and good photo in future.

Thank you!!

 

[schumionbike]

I'll share it with you every once get a chance to look at it and guess lol. Anyone know which country this photo came from? I guess that would be a start. It was taken in 1965. That should be a clue.

 

[Goontz]

Vietnam.

 

[schumionbike]

well, that's a start. South or North? I'm wondering how well this photo is known outside of Vietnam, this photo is almost completely recogizable for any Vietnamese, especially in the ....... I guess the world have a different spin on that war. There is an interesting story behind the photo, I'll wait just a little more before I let you know.

 

[Josh66]

I'm wondering how well this photo is known outside of Vietnam [...]

This is my first time seeing it... I'm interested in hearing the story behind it now though...

 

[Goontz]

I've also never seen it, but I was able to find that it's titled Thuong Tiec (Tiếc thương), by photographer Nguyen Ngoc Hanh. I believe it translates roughly to Lamentation, Mourning, or Sorrow. I think I did get a good translation with a bit of the story on the photo, but it was pretty rough so I'd hate to post it if it's inaccurate. Please do post the story

 

[c.cloudwalker]

Yes, I do know this photo and Goontz is right about its author. Most people who worked in Vietnam during the war at the very least know of him, Nguyen Ngoc Hahn. A lot of us met him.

Can't say that I remember the story about this specific shot but his own story is quite fascinating. Just one example is the fact that he stayed in Vietnam when he could have gotten on an helicopter at the time of the fall of Saigon and he paid dearly for that. He now lives in the US.

 

[GeneralBenson]

Great photo.

As far as copyrights go... My understanding is that copyrights stay in place for 70 years after the creators death. I don't know if that's just in the US or what. But chances are that it's still copyrighted.

 

[KmH]

The US is a signator of the Berne Convention, as of March 1, 1989, which is an international copyright agreement.

Current US copyright law, the Copyright Act of 1976, (Title 17 of the United States Code) applies to photographs made from January 1, 1978.

For images made prior to 12/1/1978 the rules get rather complex. The only images that are for sure in the public domain were made prior to 1923.

 

[schumionbike]

hey guys, thanks for the comment on the copyright. It's a link now

The Photograph is named : Tiec Thuong, by Nguyen Ngoc Hanh. "Lamenting" is probably the best translation. The following is the story in the word of the photographer.

"In around 1965, the Viet Cong attacked into a barrack area in Cu Chi, just outside of Saigon. Our unit was sent to secure the area. When the Viet Cong had left, they leave the bodies of six fighters from the local militia. All 6 bodies were decapitated. When we got to the area where the bodies were being stored, a young girl was crying and wailing as she was looking for the body of her husband. I helped her find the dogtag to identify the body of her husband. Afterward, the body was wrapped up and to be sent home. The next day, I returned to the area with the hope of getting a couple of pictures of the young girl but she was still in an unstable state so the task simply couldn't be done. I return to Nga Ba Ong Ta (Saigon) on leave, I decided to ask my daughter who at the time was only 11 to ask around if she know any one of her friends who would be to pose because I want to recreate the image of what I saw earlier at Cu Chi. Tam is the girl that my daughter managed to find, she's currently living in Oklohoma. At that point in time, she was only 19 years old. Her fiance at that time was a special force soldier who was sent on a covert mission into North Vietnam but his plane was shot down and a result, he was captured as a POW. I came to her family asked for their permission to let her go on a photoshoot with me. The location of the picture was at a bar on Bien Hoa Highway. One of my friend plays the flute so I had him sitting in the adjencent room and told him to play him to play all the sad and soulful music that at the time was popular on Saigon radio. My daughter was also there, she read to Tam all the letters that were sent to her by her fiance. I prepared her hair the way it look in the photo, I gave her a dog tag, one which I got from the black market, one which seem like it was made during the French period. Given the settings, she thought of her fiancé and began to cry, the tears that rolled down her cheek and onto her hands were real. The two tears that is on the dog tag was created by me. I was able to get 6 frames off when she settled down and did not cry any more. This particular was captured during the height of her emotions."

That's from an interview with Nguyen Ngoc Hanh. Sorry the translation isn't particular, sentences that sound good in Vietnamese sound kind of arkward in English, I didn't want to change the context to much. Further, there was a famous song inspired this photograph, the song is called "Tam The Bai" or "The Dog Tag", in the lyric basically go " after the war, what is there left, or would there just be a dog tag silently carrying your name".

My take on all of this is, sometimes, the dog tag is the only thing that's left to identify the soldier, the only that's left for their love ones.

Hope you guys got something from it.

here is a link to page where I got the picture and the story from. There are other works of his on there.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://tambut.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/nnhanh_tiecthuong.jpg&imgrefurl=http://tambut.wordpress.com/2009/06/24/nhi%25E1%25BA%25BFp-%25E1%25BA%25A3nh-gia-nguy%25E1%25BB%2585n-ng%25E1%25BB%258Dc-h%25E1%25BA%25A1nh/&usg=__fYA6Vwu-tIsIlpmr0iaDlRj4cvo=&h=400&w=267&sz=44&hl=en&start=2&itbs=1&tbnid=lGafLHVfjn_xaM:&tbnh=124&tbnw=83&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtiec%2Bthuong%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG