SARA ROSNER
Staff Writer
While the war in Iraq remains on the periphery of reality for many Americans, Pepperdine students, faculty and other members of the community heard a first-hand account of the conflict Monday night.
Photojournalist David Leeson presented images and recounted his experience in Smother’s Theatre on Monday night as the third edition to the Dean’s Distinguished Lecture series.
Leeson, who won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize in the category of Breaking News Photography, remained humble about his experience and his achievements.
“No success is ever the result of one man’s effort,” Leeson said. “I spent four days calling and thanking people for help with the award.”
The winning photographs were taken by Leeson on assignment for the Dallas Morning News where he has been on staff for more than 20 years. As an embedded journalist in the U.S. Army Third Infantry Division, Third Brigade Combat Team, Task Force 2-69 of Fort Benning, Ga., Leeson stayed with troops for six weeks and saw 23 days of frontline contact.
“They were just regular folks like you and I and some of the finest people I have ever met,” Leeson said of the soldiers.
The photographer’s modest and unassuming manner belies a lifetime of work that has been riddled with life-threatening risk in some of the most dangerous parts of the globe. In addition to the war in Iraq, Leeson has also covered apartheid in Africa, civil unrest in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and Sudan, armed conflict in Angola and Kuwait and the effects of natural disaster in Turkey.
“None of these places are on our list of best places to go as tourists,” said Dr. Ken Waters, professor of journalism, as he introduced the main speaker. “It’s been a lifestyle that few of us have had the opportunity to experience and most of us would say no thanks.”
While his career has been exciting and prestigious, Leeson also acknowledged that the brutal nature of his work has had a personal price.
“I’ve got some scabs and I just don’t pick at them,” Leeson said. “In some ways, I wish I hadn’t gone (to many of the overseas conflicts).”
The photographer mentioned that it took him almost a year to recover from his time in Iraq and thanked his wife Kim for her support. Kim Leeson, a former employee of the Dallas Morning News, was in the audience with their infant son Gabriel and her parents.
In addition to photography, Leeson also began making video for the Dallas Morning News in 2000, and has composed more than 70 short features and three documentaries, one of which he presented at Smother’s Theatre. The documentary “War Stories” (2003) won the Edward R. Murrow award for outstanding electronic journalism and a National Headliners award for Best Television Documentary.
His work has been recognized by The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Time, Newsweek and a host of other news agencies. His video has also been featured on ABC’s “World News Tonight.”
“I wanted to make a change,” said Leeson of his pursuits. “I wanted to find the photograph that would end all of the madness.”
02-17-2005