Bill Foley

Last updated
Bill Foley
Born
William Foley
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater Indiana University
Occupation Photojournalist, lecturer and speaker
Spouse(s) Cary Vaughan
Awards Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography (1983)
International Press Freedom Award (1991)

William Foley is an American photojournalist whose work has been recognized by several national and international awards, including a Pulitzer Prize [1] [2] and International Press Freedom Awards. He has worked on assignment in 47 countries, with a particular focus on the Middle East, [3] and currently lectures in fine arts (photography).

Contents

Photojournalist career

Completing his studies at Indiana University [4] in 1978, Foley left Indiana and took a $99 one-way flight to Amsterdam, where he began to tour Europe. [3] In London, he met photo editor Horst Faas, then the Associated Press (AP) photo chief for the Middle East and Europe. [3] Faas sent Foley on assignment to Egypt, where he worked for the next several years, primarily covering the presidency of Anwar Sadat. [3] Foley was present at the 6 October 1981 military parade in which Sadat was assassinated, and photographed him only moments before his death, calling the photograph "The Last Smile". [5]

At Sabra and the Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon in September 1982, Foley shot a "series of pictures of victims and survivors of the [Sabra and Shatila] massacre", for which he and AP won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography. [1] [2] [6] He later described the scene he found upon entering the camp after the departure of the Christian militiamen who had been guarding its gates:

Nothing was moving. In a place where I had made many friends, and hundreds of photographs, it was many things, but never silent. Usually, kids were yelling and playing, women were talking, dogs were barking, cars horns were honking ... but, on this morning, all was quiet. I was surrounded by piles of what, at first glance, looked like garbage, but as my brain started to work, I realized it was piles of corpses. The smell of decay was everywhere, as many of those killed had been dead for over 24 hours, in the September heat. [7]

From 1984 to 1990, he worked as a contract photographer for Time , covering stories including the Palestinian intifada, Operation Desert Shield, the Iran–Iraq War, and Nelson Mandela's first visit to New York City. [3] He has also done photographic project for the New York-based Children's Aid Society and the UK-based Save the Children. [3]

For his efforts to free Hezbollah hostage and Beirut AP colleague Terry A. Anderson, Foley received one of the first International Press Freedom Awards from the Committee to Protect Journalists in 1991, along with his wife Cary Vaughan. [8] [9]

Academic career

He currently works as an Assistant Professor of Photography at Marian University in Indianapolis. [10] He also taught for five years as an adjunct professor at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. [10]

Related Research Articles

Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography

The Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography is one of the American Pulitzer Prizes annually awarded for journalism. From 2000 it has used the "breaking news" name but it is considered a continuation of the Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography, which was awarded from 1968 to 1999. Prior to 1968, a single Prize was awarded for photojournalism, the Pulitzer Prize for Photography, which was replaced in that year by Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography and Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography.

Sabra and Shatila massacre 1982 killing of civilians in Beirut, Lebanon

The Sabra and Shatila massacre was the killing of between 460 and 3,500 civilians, mostly Palestinians and Lebanese Shiites, by a militia close to the Kataeb Party, a predominantly Christian Lebanese right-wing party, in the Sabra neighborhood and the adjacent Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon. From approximately 18:00 on 16 September to 08:00 on 18 September 1982, a widespread massacre was carried out by the militia in plain sight of the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), its ally. The Phalanges were ordered by the IDF to clear Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) fighters out of Sabra and Shatila, as part of the IDF maneuvering into West Beirut. The IDF received reports of some of the Phalange atrocities in Sabra and Shatila but did not take any action to prevent or stop the massacre.

Elie Hobeika was a commander in the Lebanese Forces militia during the Lebanese Civil War where he gained notoriety for his involvement in the Sabra and Shatila massacre. He became president of the Lebanese Forces political party until he was ousted in 1986. He then founded the Promise Party and was elected to serve two terms in the Parliament of Lebanon. In January 2002, he was assassinated by a car bomb at his house in Beirut.

Nick Ut

Huỳnh Công Út, known professionally as Nick Ut, is a Vietnamese-American photographer for the Associated Press (AP) who works out of Los Angeles. He won both the 1973 Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography and the 1973 World Press Photo of the Year for "The Terror of War", depicting children in flight from a napalm bombing during the Vietnam War. His best-known photo features a naked 9-year-old girl, Phan Thị Kim Phúc, running toward the camera from a South Vietnamese napalm strike that mistakenly hit Trảng Bàng village instead of nearby North Vietnamese troops. On the 40th anniversary of that Pulitzer Prize-winning photo in September 2012, Ut became the third person inducted by the Leica Hall of Fame for his contributions to photojournalism. On March 29, 2017, he retired from AP. On January 13, 2021 Ut became the first journalist to receive the National Medal of Arts, the highest award given to artists and arts patrons by the federal government.

Kahan Commission

The Kahan Commission, formally known as the Commission of Inquiry into the Events at the Refugee Camps in Beirut, was established by the Israeli government on 28 September 1982, to investigate the Sabra and Shatila massacre. The Kahan Commission was chaired by the President of the Supreme Court, Yitzhak Kahan. Its other two members were Supreme Court Judge Aharon Barak, and Major general (res.) Yona Efrat. The Commission was to make recommendations on Israeli involvement in the massacre through an investigation of:

[A]ll the facts and factors connected with the atrocity carried out by a unit of the Lebanese Forces against the civilian population in the Shatilla and Sabra camps.

Leila Shahid is a Palestinian diplomat.

Horst Faas

Horst Faas was a German photo-journalist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner. He is best known for his images of the Vietnam War.

The following are the Pulitzer Prizes for 1983.

Shatila refugee camp

The Shatila refugee camp, also known as the Chatila refugee camp, is a settlement originally set up for Palestinian refugees in 1949. It is located in southern Beirut, Lebanon and houses more than 9,842 registered Palestine refugees. Since the eruption of the Syrian Civil War, the refugee camp has received a large number of Syrian refugees. In 2014, the camp's population was estimated to be between 10,000 and 22,000.

Bilal Hussein is an Iraqi Associated Press photojournalist based in Fallujah, Iraq. He was arrested in Ramadi by U.S. forces in April 2006 and detained on suspicion of aiding insurgents in Iraq. He was taken into custody to face charges in the Iraqi Central Court, reportedly over the circumstances of his photos, which were supplied by the U.S. military. American and Iraqi governments were criticized for violating the Geneva Conventions, and for detaining Hussein without evidence. He was finally released without charge in 2008. That year, Hussein won an International Press Freedom Award.

Mohammad Malas

Mohammad Malas is a prominent Syrian filmmaker. Malas directed several documentary and feature films that garnered international recognition. He is among the first auteur filmmakers in Syrian cinema.

Neal Hirsh Ulevich is an American photographer. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1977 for "photographs of disorder and brutality in the streets of Bangkok".

Cary Vaughan is an American English language instructor and journalist best known for her role in the Terry A. Anderson hostage crisis in Lebanon. An instructor at the American University of Beirut and a part-time worker at Associated Press bureau there, Vaughan and her husband Bill Foley, an AP photojournalist, were friends with Anderson prior to his abduction. Following his abduction by Hezbollah militants, Vaughan and Foley worked to secure his release. For their efforts, the pair received one of the first International Press Freedom Awards from the Committee to Protect Journalists in 1991.

The Dream or Al-Manam is a 1987 Syrian documentary film by the director Mohammad Malas. The film is composed of a collection of interviews with Palestinian refugees in Lebanon during the civil war. The refugees were interviewed by Malas about what dreams they saw when they went to sleep. The film was shot between 1980–81 before the infamous massacre in Sabra and Shatila, where part of the film was set. It was only released in 1987.

Karsten Thielker was a German Pulitzer Prize–winning photographer and journalist. He focused primarily on exhibition design, photography and photojournalism.

Manu Brabo (1981) is a Spanish photojournalist who was captured in Libya along with three other journalists while covering the Libyan Civil War in 2011 and who was part of the Associated Press team to win the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography in 2013.

Abdul Rahman Katanani is a Palestinian artist born and living in Sabra refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon. Katanani is a third generation Palestinian refugee; his grandparents left Yazour—a small town now called Azor—in Jaffa in 1948.

Kyaw Soe Oo

Kyaw Soe Oo is a Myanmar Reuters journalist who, with fellow reporter Wa Lone, was arrested on 12 December 2017 in Myanmar because of their investigation into the Inn Din massacre. A police witness testified that their arrest was a case of entrapment. It is believed to have been intended to intimidate journalists.

Martha Mendoza is an Associated Press journalist whose reporting has helped free over 2,000 enslaved fishermen and prompted action by the U.S. Congress and the White House. 

Janet Lee Stevens was an American journalist, human rights advocate, translator, and scholar of popular Arabic theater. She lived in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War and chronicled the experiences of Palestinian refugees before and after the Sabra and Shatila Massacre of September 16–18, 1982.

References

  1. 1 2 "Spot News Photography". The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 30 October 2013.
  2. 1 2 "Today in photo history – 1982: Massacres at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon". The Dallas Morning News (dallasnews.com). 16 September 2012.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Foley, Bill. "Bill Foley Photography". billfoley.com. Archived from the original on 2 July 2012. Retrieved 3 June 2011.[ self-published source? ]
  4. ↑ "IU School of Journalism's spring speaker series to features alumni panels". Indiana University. 23 February 2011. Retrieved 3 June 2011.
  5. ↑ Foley, Bill (2006). "The Last Smile". billfoley.com. Archived from the original on September 10, 2011. Retrieved 3 June 2011.[ self-published source? ]
  6. ↑ "Neighborhood Report: Museum Mile; Renewal in Black and White". The New York Times. 16 July 2010. Retrieved 3 June 2011.
  7. ↑ Foley, Bill (2011). "The Pulitzer Series: The Chatilla Massacre". billfoley.com. Archived from the original on 24 March 2012. Retrieved 3 June 2011.
  8. ↑ "Journalists Receive 1996 Press Freedom Awards". Committee to Protect Journalists. 1996. Archived from the original on 3 June 2011. Retrieved 28 May 2011.
  9. ↑ "2 Journalists are honored for championing free press". The Robesonian. Associated Press. 30 October 1991. Retrieved 3 June 2011.
  10. 1 2 "William Foley". Marion University. Archived from the original on 26 July 2011. Retrieved 28 May 2011.
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