Bill Putnam and M. Scott Mahaskey co-exhibition

As part of its annual celebration of documentary photography, Photo Works at Glen Echo Park, Md., is proud to exhibit the work of two superb photojournalists whose images of the Iraq War are riveting, profoundly moving and disconcertingly beautiful.

“Restricted Distribution-Recent Images from Iraq” highlights the work of Bill Putnam, 33, and M. Scott Mahaskey, 36, each of whom has covered the Iraq war from the unique perspective of photojournalists embedded with American forces.

Mahaskey, currently a photojournalist employed by Gannett’s Army Times Publishing Company, spent more than twelve months as a photographer embedded in Iraq and Afghanistan. His portfolio of images made inside a battlefield junkyard in Al Anbar Province, Iraq, is a unique look into the scars of battle against an insurgent enemy.

Putnam was an Army photojournalist deployed to Baghdad in 2004 and returned to Iraq from September 2005 to June 2006 as a civilian freelance journalist. His first year in country was spent in southwest Baghdad covering the 1st Cavalry Division. During his time as a civilian, he embedded with several units notably the 10th Mountain Division and 101st Airborne Division. All told, he spent 22 months in Iraq from February 2004 to June 2006. The images of his portfolio were made on operations all over the country, Sinjar to Baghdad, and represent, to a limited degree, the human cost of the war during that time.

“It was hard to not be moved by the totality of destruction,” Mahaskey said in describing his photographs of military vehicles and other hardware that had been blown apart and riddled by gunfire. “The stacks of twisted metal were massive and visually overwhelming. In fact, it was unlike anything I had ever seen and I understood quickly that this scene needed to be shared with others.”

Said Putnam of his work, that includes images made during house-to-house searches for insurgents, and in the aftermath of devastating bombings: “I wanted to show the human element of this war. Iraq is an emotionally wrenching subject. You’re either for it or against it and there’s little middle ground. But beyond those debates or arguments are people - both military and civilian - and we mustn’t forget that.”

The work of these two photographers carries on the tradition of great wartime photographers like Larry Burrows, David Hume Kennerly, Dirck Halstead, David Douglas Duncan and Robert Capa. In every image one is aware of war’s human toll.

“It goes without saying that down in the trenches, Iraq is a crazy place, noted Putnam. “War brings out the best and worst of humanity. Often, those natural tendencies happened simultaneously. Hopefully I captured those moments.”

Added Mahaskey, remembering the “clear and silent day” on which he made his junkyard photographs: “It seemed important to step back and record the scene simply and let the subjects themselves suggest a narrative, as if making portraits of the fallen.”

0-0-0-0