I have been working on editing my book CALLED TO SERVE these past several weeks; hence fewer posts. I attended the extraordinary one woman play, “No Background Music” at the Springfield Armory two weeks ago and could not resist the temptation to add one more interview to my project with the nurse, Penny Rock, whose experiences in ’67-’68 were the basis for the performance. I journeyed to Stockbridge, MA where she was staying at the Red Lion Inn and conducted one of the most moving interviews of the close to 60 I have participated in. Penny’s stories humanized the Vietnam War by consistently demonstrating how each of the men she took care of was so much more than the uniform or the supposed cause for which he was “in country”. She also spoke with great humility about her encounters with Viet Cong people with whom she worked. My friend, Lola, the first person to witness one of these intense interviews with me, and I were able to experience the depth of commitment and integrity that Penny brought to her work as her words brought her back to those days and those men. It was overpowering.
Then this morning I was browsing www.commondreams.org and found a story that is also about humanizing a place and a people, but this time in the hopes of avoiding yet another misbegotten war. It is about a photo exhibit focused on the culture of Iran. Some of the bellicose talk of Mr. Obama and others about our possibly having to invade either Pakistan or Iran to eradicate terrorist cells has inspired Tom Loughlin to take his slide show of Iranians living their lives to the Democratic National Convention. If only someone had done that with Bush and Co. and Iraq, but there was such a frantic rush to war that such efforts would most likely have been futile. Maybe this time, especially after witnessing 5 years of horrific results from the U.S. invasion, there is hope for us to see that when we look at these photos we see, as the Rumi poem, which is the basis for the title of the show, PICTURES OF YOU, says: No matter how I see myself, I’m nothing.
Anything I am entirely is you.
Mr. Future President: This is Iran
by Deena Guzder
As the hawkish debate on the “Iran Question” continues to possess Washington, most Americans’ exposure to the country is limited to photos of a bespectacled, bearded Supreme Leader and an unshaven, uncouth firebrand of a President. But one American, Tom Loughlin, is adamant that the next President of American knows that Iran is a vibrant society of millions of people.
Loughlin, an American-born lawyer-turned-photographer, has visited Iran three times to capture Iranian life for his installation, “Pictures of you: Images of Iran.” Photos of sepia-eyed young women, downy-haired scholars, and dimpled-cheeked adolescents are part of Loughlin’s innovative effort to humanize “the other,” the Iranian people.
This week, Loughlin is taking his exhibit to the Democratic National Convention in Denver in hopes that presidental contender Barack Obama makes eye contact with a Iranian day laborer with a shy smile, a Iranian girl wistfully playing with her silk scarf, and Iranian professor with gentle eyes and a iridescently white beard. “I want all Americans to have a chance to come face-to-face with their Iranian counterparts, and I want to document Americans’ responses to the encounter,” says Loughlin whose steel-blue eyes glisten with purpose. Loughlin’s dynamic exhibit consists of an interactive 3-D still movie of photographs with sound and light that is displayed in a 26-foot-high octagonal dome, a dome which symbolizes openness and warmth in Persian culture.
For Loughlin, the exhibit should illicit a visceral response from Americans, including Barack Obama, and make them grapple with their preconceptions.
“Many Americans have strong feelings and intuitions about Iran,” Loughlin notes, “and many of their ideas have developed in an environment tainted by ignorance and suspicion . . . I hope that the show will ultimately transcend the issue of Iranian/American relations. It will illustrate how Americans exercise their freedoms and privileges – including the privilege to remain uninformed about other nations and cultures without suffering any significant consequences. We’re all made of the same flesh,” he continues, “and that somehow got lost. I want this show to make that point viscerally through the humanity of Iranian citizens and the beauty of the Persian culture.
The show is a mirror.” The name of the exhibition, “Pictures of You,” comes from a poem by Rumi:
If my head holds one thought wise and clear, it’s you.
Poor as I am, what I hold dear is you.
- (Rumi’s Kolliyaat-e Shams-e Tabrizi)
Loughlin hopes that Americans will confront their fear of “the other” and the photos of ordinary Iranians will encourage them to look more openly at other nations and cultures. And, ultimately, Loughlin hopes his exhibit will dissuade warmongering by American policymakers.
Although Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is far less of a saber-rattler than John McCain, Obama has suggested that the United States one day might have to launch surgical missile strikes into Iran and Pakistan to keep extremists from getting control of nuclear bombs. The Bush Administration’s flawed reliance on violence has no place at the Democratic National Convention and Americans must demand to know how presidential candidates, especially ones who allegedly represent “hope” and “change,” will promote a better future for both Americans and Iranians. Loughlin is confident that recognizing the extraordinary commonality of the human experience is the first step in a new direction for a new America.
Loughlin’s work can be viewed at http://www.picturesofyouiran.com