Everything Changed: new photographic exhibition to commemorate the Falklands conflict, 40 years on.
A new exhibition to mark the 40th anniversary of the outbreak of the Falklands War has opened at Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust. Falklands 40: Everything Changed is a new exhibition by photographer and journalist Graham Bound which showcases a unique photographic journey through the eyes of a local journalist in occupied Port Stanley. The collection of 40 photographs provides a rare record of Argentina’s invasion, the subsequent war, and its aftermath.
Bound, who was born in the Falklands, was 24 years old in 1982 and the editor of the Port Stanley newspaper, Penguin News. Under Argentine occupation, publication of the paper ceased so he began recording what was going on around him in occupied Stanley. For a few days after the invasion, he was able to walk freely with his camera but as the intensity of the conflict increased, he was forced to take photographs much more carefully, often from within buildings.
Almost 40-years later, Bound worked with Alex Schneideman, Flow Photographic, to digitise and restore the faded prints, and produce new prints from negatives that had previously never been printed.
Bound says: “Some of the images are not particularly pleasant to look at. Interesting, yes, but not enjoyable. Fortunately, the grimmest reality is hidden in the deep black shadow of the monochrome prints. But in some of the photos, light falls on the faces and the eyes of men and we gain a glimpse of their emotions: despair, pride, exhaustion, determination and fear.
“Almost 40 years after I took the photographs, Alex performed digital photographic magic and brought my images to life. Some of my once written-off photos are now the most dramatic in the exhibition. I hope these photographs remind people of the dramatic and dangerous days of 1982; the time when Everything Changed.”
“Everything Changed” will be showing from 5 April to 14 June and admission is included in an entry ticket to The Historic Dockyard Chatham.
