With the curiosity of a child, renowned photographer Nick Ut is busy exploring sights and sounds around Thiruvananthapuram. Expressing surprise over local photographers waiting for him at 3.30 am at the airport, the diminutive photographer shakes his mane of silvery hair and says with a laugh that he has now become the focus of photographers all over the world. “Today, when I tried to click a picture, there were many cameramen aiming their cameras at me!” he says.
Ut’s iconic photograph of a screaming, nude girl fleeing a napalm attack in Vietnam in 1972, is considered one of the most influential images in the world. It played a decisive role in turning public opinion in the US against the war in Vietnam and soon brought the war to an end.
Ut, then barely 21, became a Pulitzer prize-winning lensman and went on to carve a distinguished career as a photographer with Associated Press. His camera captured triumphs and travails of celebrities and glittering events. Decades later, Ut, who retired from Associated Press in 2017, continues to be feted for his photograph of the ‘Napalm Girl’, as she came to be called, that unerringly captured the horrors of war.
In Thiruvananthapuram, he was honoured with the ‘World Photographer Prize’ instituted by the Kerala Media Academy. Ut spent some time with MetroPlus talking about that famous photograph that took him from ‘hell to Hollywood’ and about war photographers in the present day.
He is humbled by the award, he says, and appreciates the gesture of the Kerala government. Pleased with the burst of colours and smiling faces that greeted him in the city, Ut plans to go around the city to click the people and the place.
On Wednesday morning, accompanied by Raul Roa, photo editor of the Los Angeles Times, he explored Palayam market, Statue and its neighbourhood. Later, at Leela Kovalam, where they are staying, he admired the flowers floating in polished brass urulis and buried his nose in the petals to catch a whiff of the fragrance. “I always catch up on sleep while travelling so that I feel fresh enough to explore the places I travel to,” he says, while waiting for lunch to arrive. His soup turns cold as he talks about his adventures as a cameraman.
Excerpts from an interview with Ut:
Photographs from war zones in different parts of the world continue to shock viewers... Has anything changed?
Many things have changed. In our days, the media was never targeted by warring parties. In fact, they wanted people all over the world to see what was happening on the ground. Now, so many mediapersons have been killed in action while they were shooting pictures. Anja Niedringhaus, my own colleague in AP, was killed in Afghanistan when a gun man shot her while she was travelling in a taxi. Covering wars has never been so dangerous for the media. Once embedded journalists came into existence, they could see only what the authorities wanted them to see. So some mediapersons try to sneak off and take photographs. But that is also not safe. At present, many are trying to prevent media from covering what is actually happening. That was not the case when we were covering the war.
Have you been hurt in the course of your work?
I was wounded three or four times, twice in Cambodia. I got hit in the stomach when a rocket exploded. I could have been killed, but I was lucky.
Do you keep in touch with Kim Phuc (‘Napalm Girl’)?
Yes. We are in touch. Kim is now in Canada and a grandmother. I was invited for her son’s wedding.
A word of advice for young photographers
Now-a-days, youngsters go on clicking pictures non-stop. There would be hundreds of pictures. Editors would not be happy having to choose from so many pictures that almost look the same. One has to wait for the moment and click. See, that is how your photographer is doing it. Then he can choose the best ones to show the editor.
Do you recall those moments when you took that famous photograph?
There was heavy fighting and I had left early in the morning from the AP office in Saigon. The roads were filled with dead bodies, refugees and soldiers. We reached Trang Bang. Many photographers and TV crews were taking photographs. I had taken plenty of photos and thought of going back to Saigon. It was around noon. Then I saw a soldier throw guide bombs and heard the sound of an aeroplane. Then came bombs that were fiery orangish red as they dropped from the skies. Mine was a black and white camera and so I could not capture its complete impact. Since many people had sought shelter in a “pagoda” we assumed none had been hurt. That is when we saw people running, screaming and crying for help. All of us were carrying four or five cameras and we were all taking photographs. I saw an elderly lady with a baby. We caught the baby boy’s last moments....
While all the photographers were taking her picture, I moved a little closer and that is when I saw her come out screaming and crying. Skin was peeling off her body. I took the water I had with me and poured it over her. But she said, she wanted to drink it. Then we took her and some other children to my van. She crouched on the floor and was screaming in pain.
I took her to the hospital and forced them to help her saying that I was from the media and finally went back to my office.
What was the reaction of your bosses?
In those days, it was not easy to transmit photos. I had to go to a post office to send the photogaphs. No computers. So it had to go through Tokyo to reach the US. If there was a bad line, then there would be delays. I was lucky as there were no delays that day. Later, I heard that there was a debate among the editors because the girl was naked and there was a strict policy against using such photos. Some mediapersons would blur the photo. However, we at AP were not allowed to do that.
Finally, it went on the front page all across the world. I was told that President [Richard] Nixon thought that the photograph was fake. It seems he suspected that she had been burnt because of cooking oil!
After you moved to Los Angeles, what were the pictures that you remember having shot?
Oh, they were so many. All these celebrities, if they were in trouble, I was there — OJ Simpson, Paris Hilton, Michael Jackson, Robert Downey…so many
So, after your retirement…
No retirement. I cannot stop taking photos. I will continue doing that.
WISH LIST
“In Kerala, I want to see elephants, Chinese fishing nets, different kinds of bananas and lots of smiling faces. I travel extensively now and everywhere I go, I try to catch the local life.”