Photographer Query: In Country Slide Photos Wanted

Kendra Rennick, a photo editor in New York, is working on a project to collect photo slides that Vietnam veterans took during their tours of duty. “I am interested in a wide range of roles they had overseas and their images, ” she told us. “They do not need to be professional photographs. Snap shots and candid moments are almost more interesting to me.”

Her goal for the project, Rennick says, “is to curate a collection of imagery shot by servicemen and women who served in Vietnam. I am most interested in photo slides for their aesthetic, as well as slides’ original intention. The idea that slides are shot with the hopes of being shown to a group of people and projected on a wall interests me. Most people have no way of viewing their slides so they usually sit in a box untouched or viewed.”

Rennick already has accumulated some slides. Based on them, she says, “I am finding a very honest depiction of day-to-day life and interactions of service people in Vietnam. Lots of interesting landscapes and shots of camaraderie.” You can view several of the slides at instagram.com/explore/tags/thevietnamslideproject/?hl=en

Rennick say she was inspired to start the project after a close friend “recently lost her father, a Vietnam veteran. He struggled with PTSD for many years, never talking about his time in Vietnam. My friend recently found a box of slides he had taken while overseas and reached out to me to help her look through his memories. This has turned into a long-term, archive-based photography project.”

If you decide to help, Rennick will reimburse shipping costs, and mail your slides back, along with print and a digital copies. For more info, email kendra.rennick@gmail.com