March 19, 2023, is the 20th anniversary of the start of the U.S. war in Iraq in 2003. The war in Afghanistan was already underway, having begun a year and a half earlier. Both wars marked a generation, and the war in Iraq is still going on, at least in terms of the ongoing presence of U.S. soldiers.
Today war continues to be a fact of life in the world, and in the lives of the people of California. The anniversary of the Iraq war gives us a moment when we can look back at the way our community responded when these conflicts started. Then, as now, people did not accept the reality of endless war or its normalization. They sought to change it.
These are images from the protests against the wars as they unfolded between 2001 and 2007. While the protests against the Vietnam War has entered history as the massive events they were, the protests against the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq also brought thousands of people into the streets of San Francisco and Oakland. But unlike the protests of the Vietnam era, these marches and demonstrations have been virtually erased from the historical record.
These photographs, taken by David Bacon, document them. They demonstrate the depth of opposition, and the diverse faces of those involved.
People didn't just show up once and go home; they came out again and again from 2001 to 2007. The images show that the protesters were overwhelmingly young. They were very diverse racially and nationally, especially the highly visible and vocal presence of African Americans and Asian Americans.
This is not surprising, since the Bay Area is home to Congresswoman Barbara Lee, who was the one vote in Congress against the military authorization bill that sanctioned the start of the wars. While she may have been a lone voice in Congress, these photographs make clear how popular her opposition was. African American civil rights leaders rallied around her. The marches featured actors, singers and celebrities who sought to add their voices to hers.
The images show an extraordinary cultural diversity. Signs and banners spoke in many languages. Korean drummers walked with contingents that started in Chinatown's Portsmouth Square. Dancers danced. Elaborate banners created a colorful atmosphere. The determination of demonstrators is obvious in their acts of civil disobedience, and the photographs show the emotion in young faces as they were arrested.
The photographs were originally taken on film, and have been scanned and digitized in a cooperative project with the Green Library of Stanford University, where David Bacon's photography archive is housed
This presesntation coincides with the 20th anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, on March 19, 2023. Participants in these protests can identify themselves and each other, comment on the images, and add their own observations about the war and the impact of the protests, by responding to David Bacon at dbacon@igc.org. MORE THAN A WALL/MAS QUE UN MURO
Exhibition at University of Texas
David Bacon Moody Fellow Professional-in-Residence
Moody College of Communications - DMC 5.102 School of Journalism and Media Moody Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion University of Texas at Austin
This exhibition inaugurates the new gallery at the School of Journalism and Media. MORE THAN A WALL / MAS QUE UN MURO
More Than a Wall / Mas que Un Muro explores the many aspects of the border region through photographs taken by David Bacon over a period of 30 years. These photographs trace the changes in the border wall itself, and the social movements in border communities, factories and fields. This bilingual book provides a reality check, to allow us to see the border region as its people, with their own history of movements for rights and equality, and develop an alternative vision in which the border can be a region where people can live and work in solidarity with each other. - Gaspar Rivera-Salgado
David Bacon has given us, through his beautiful portraits, the plight of the American migrant worker, and the fierce spirit of those who provide and bring to us comfort and sustenance. -- Lila Downs
- a book of photographs by David Bacon and oral histories created during 30 years of covering the people and social movements of the Mexico/U.S. border - a complex, richly textured documentation of a world in newspaper headlines daily, but whose reality, as it's lived by border residents, is virtually invisible. - 440 pages - 354 duotone black-and-white photographs - a dozen oral histories - incisive journalism and analysis by David Bacon, Don Bartletti, Luis Escala, Guillermo Alonso and Alberto del Castillo. - completely bilingual in English and Spanish - published by El Colegio de la Frontera Norte with support from the UCLA Institute for Labor Research and Education and the Center for Mexican Studies, the Werner Kohlstamm Family Fund, and the Green Library at Stanford University
"The "border" is just a line. It's the people who matter - their relationships with or without or across that line. The book helps us feel the impact of the border on people living there, and helps us figure out how we talk to each other about it. The germ of the discussion are these wonderful and eye-opening pictures, and the voices that help us understand what these pictures mean." - JoAnn Intili, director, The Werner-Kohnstamm Family Fund IN THE FIELDS OF THE NORTH/EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE
Photographs by David Bacon
La Quinta Museum 77885 Avenida Montezuma La Quinta, CA 92253 January 8, 2023 – April 16, 2023
Global Museum San Francisco State University 1600 Holloway Avenue San Francisco, CA October 8 - December 3, 2023
Online Interviews and Presentations
Red Lens Episode 6: David Bacon on US-Mexico border photography Brad Segal: On episode 6 of Red Lens, I talk with David Bacon.
David Bacon is a California-based writer and documentary photographer. A former union organizer, today he documents labor, the global economy, war and migration, and the struggle for human rights. We talk about David's new book, 'More than a Wall / Mas que un muro' which includes 30 years of his photography and oral histories from communities & struggles in the U.S.-Mexico border region. https://www.patreon.com/posts/71834023?fbclid=IwAR0BRhHYbrYU3BoeoAMFKU_zdHs5Xirmmt1LzQtfwf1yD8p9EYLXKhzzbDE
Letters and Politics - Three Decades of Photographing The Border & Border Communities https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nvs6SyXsM-4 Host Mitch Jeserich interviews David Bacon, a photojournalist, author, broadcaster and former labor organizer. He has reported on immigrant and labor issues for decades. His latest book, More Than A Wall, is a collection of his photographs of the border and border communities spanning three decades.
Exploitation or Dignity - What Future for Farmworkers UCLA Latin American Institute Based on a new report by the Oakland Institute, journalist and photographer David Bacon documents the systematic abuse of workers in the H-2A program and its impact on the resident farmworker communities, confronted with a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXKa2lHJXMs
Documentary Matters - View from the US Social Documentary Network Four SDN photographers explore themes of racial justice, migration, and #MeToo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWl-uENA7SQ&t=1641s There's More Work to be Done Housing Assistance Council and National Endowment for the Arts This exhibition documents the work and impact of the struggle for equitable and affordable housing in rural America, inspired by the work of George “Elfie” Ballis. https://www.thereismoreworktobedone.com/david-bacon Dark Eyes A beautiful song by Lila Downs honoring essential workers, accompanied by photographs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdC2gE3SNWw
Exhibited throughout the pandemic in the Cecil H. Green Library at Stanford. The online exhibition (https://exhibits.stanford.edu/bacon), which includes additional content not included in the physical show, is accessible to everyone, and is part of an accessible digital spotlight collection that includes significant images from this body of work. For a catalog: (https://web.stanford.edu/dept/spec_coll/NonVendorPubOrderform2017.pdf)
IN THE FIELDS OF THE NORTH / EN LOS CAMPOS DEL NORTE
Photographs and text by David Bacon University of California Press / Colegio de la Frontera Norte 302 photographs, 450pp, 9”x9” paperback, $34.95 (in the U.S.)
order the book on the UC Press website: ucpress.edu/9780520296077 use source code 16M4197 at checkout, receive a 30% discount
Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants (Beacon Press, 2008) Recipient: C.L.R. James Award, best book of 2007-2008 http://www.beacon.org/Illegal-People-P780.aspx
