Belmont Citizen-Herald, MA
Dec 3 2004
Eminent photographers to talk about news
Project SAVE Armenian Photograph Archives and the Armenian Library
and Museum of America (ALMA) will present a panel discussion on
Tuesday, Dec. 7, featuring Harry L. Koundakjian, Associated Press
international photo editor; Steve Kurkjian, Boston Globe
investigative reporter and editor; and Garo Lachinian, photographer
and former director of photography at the Boston Herald.
The topic, “Image is Everything: Photography and the World’s
Defining Moments,” is a public program accompanying the exhibit “50
Photographs/50 years: Harry L. Koundakjian, AP Photographer.”
With more than 50 years under his belt as a news photographer
and journalist, Koundakjian helped set the tone for photojournalism
in the Middle East. In 1959 he began working for the Associated Press
as a freelancer. In 1969 he joined AP as staff and established the AP
Photo Desk in Beirut. As the AP’s chief Middle East photographer, he
was responsible for covering all 13 Arab countries in the Middle
East, North and East Africa, Turkey and Iran. His current photograph
exhibition, produced by Project SAVE Archives and exhibited at ALMA,
covers an extraordinary array of events.
Stephen A. Kurkjian has been a reporter and editor at The Boston
Globe since 1968. He has served as an investigative reporter and was
a founding member of The Globe’s investigative Spotlight Team. He has
won more than 25 regional and national reporting awards, including
three Pulitzer Prizes, in 1971, 1981 and 2003. In 1986 he was named
chief of The Globe’s Washington Bureau and for six years oversaw the
paper’s 10 reporters in Washington. In addition, while in Washington,
D.C., he covered the Supreme Court, the Justice Department, and the
White House during the first war in Iraq. Last year he was honored by
New England’s Society of Professional Journalists for a lifetime of
achievement in journalism.
Belmont resident Garo Lachinian has been a news photographer for
nearly 20 years. At the Concord, N.H. Monitor, he covered New
Hampshire’s reaction to the death of its hometown teacher/astronaut
Christa McAuliffe in the 1986 Challenger explosion. At the Baltimore
Sun, he did a five-part series on corruption in the Baltimore City
Police Department, and covered three presidential primaries and two
presidential elections. He joined the Boston Herald in November 1998
as its special projects photographer. Later as director of
photography, he oversaw all aspects of the Photography Department’s
operations and managed the staff of 25 photographers and picture
editors. He was named Photographer of the Year in July 2000 by the
Boston Press Photographers Association. In addition to five Pulitzer
Prize nominations, Lachinian’s honors include first place for General
News Photography in the 1995 World Press Photo Competition, and
numerous awards from the National Press Photographers Association and
the Associated Press.
These three distinguished panelist will discuss the role
photography plays in today’s news reporting, from the point of view
of the photographer, the journalist and the public. The panel will be
moderated by Ruth Thomasian, executive director of Project SAVE
Archives.
The public is invited to this free panel discussion which starts
at 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 7, and will include a question-and-answer
period.
The exhibit, “50 years/50 photographs: Harry L. Koundakjian, AP
Photographer,” will be open for viewing starting at 7 p.m. The
exhibit will run through Jan. 14, at Project SAVE Armenian Photograph
Archives and the Armenian Library and Museum of America, 65 Main St.,
third floor gallery, Watertown. ALMA is wheelchair accessible.
For directions and more information, contact Project SAVE
Archives at 617-923-4542 or [email protected].