A Canadian Photography exhibition: 'Palestine, El Salvador, Home'
Syria, Culture, 11/3/2000

The Embassy of Canada in Damascus and the Canadian- Syrian Education Resource Center on October 23 and 24 organized a Photography Exhibition at the University of Damascus by renowned Canadian photographer Larry Towell under the title " Palestine, El-Salvador & Home".

In a statement to Syria Times, political counselor at the Canadian Embassy Marina B. Laker said " We had many months ago a plan to bring the exhibition to the International Photo Exhibition in Aleppo and it was very-well received in Aleppo". She added following the great success it witnessed in Aleppo " we decided because we had a magnificent exhibition, not to lose the opportunity to bring it to Damascus ".

She explained that the Canadian embassy in Damascus has always tried to promote a Canadian culture to strengthen understanding in the Syrians of Canada 's artists and our world 's perspective".

She continued: " If any thing this photo shows that people who live in difficult times and places can come from anywhere in the world and its is a human responsibility to help them overcome their difficulties .

In his 60 exhibits which are distributed equally to the three place from which he derived his themes, Larry Towell moves from the brutality which all too often defines our under standing of life of places like El-Salvador and Palestine, to the quite and hopeful dissentions of a rural lifestyle there at his home Canada. His pictures explore what is to live life in the face of mortality. Deaths in the streets, children waving guns, grief stricken and inconsolable mothers- images such as these tend to evoke sensations of powerlessness or guilt, making it difficult to bring them into our lives with meaning.

After the mixture of social upheaval and the resiliency of the human spirit that Towell has witnessed on his travels, it would hardly seem surprising if he were to have more difficulty than most conforming to the materialistic ideals this culture tends to promote. The home life he pictures is one built on the ideals of self- sufficiency and positive dissension. Even so, his small farm in south western Ontario appears like a vision of some erstwhile Eden after viewing the upheavals experienced by the people of El Salvador and Palestine.

Larry Towell was born in Ontario ( Canada) in 1953. Shortly after graduating from new York University 's Fine Arts program in 1976, Towell began his first major project, focusing on the experience of working at a mission in Calcutta, an extremely poor city. The result was a book, " Burning Cadillac's " a collection of Towel 's poetry and photographs, published in 1983. His most recent areas of concentration are the repercussions of the Vietnam War, Mennonite life in Mexico and Canada and the Gaza Strip in Palestine. His work has appeared in numerous magazines and periodicals including life, Esquire, Rolling Stone and the New York Times Magazine. He is the first person born in Canada to become a full member of " Magnum photos".

Towel won the Photo of the year award and first place in three different categories of World Press photos annual awards.

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