NCSU Libraries Focus Online

Volume 23 number 2 - Winter 2003

By Linda McCormick, Special Collections

Certain photographic images remain indelible in America's consciousness--Jack Ruby's assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald, a Vietnamese girl running toward a camera with her body burned by napalm, or American Marines hoisting the flag at Iwo Jima during World War II. These compelling, eyewitness images, which captured a moment in American history, are all past winners of the Pulitzer Prize in photography and will be featured among other Pulitzer photography winners in an upcoming exhibition at the NCSU Libraries.

The exhibition, entitled The Pulitzer Prize Photographs: Capture the Moment, will run from September 19 through December 14, 2003, in the D. H. Hill Library. Cyma Rubin of the Business of Entertainment, Inc., an NC State alumna, curated the original exhibition in 2000. The traveling exhibition that will be shown at the Libraries has been updated by Rubin since then and features more than 120 Pulitzer photographs dating from 1942 to the present.

The Pulitzer Prize for photojournalism documents the breadth of human experience, from the triumphs to profound moments of despair. These photographs have the power to move viewers to action, as well as to encourage contemplation of the world both past and present. Rubin notes that each time she views a Pulitzer photograph she sees "the movement. The photographers have an innate sense of what is happening emotionally and intellectually to the subjects they are photographing." According to Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Lucian Perkins of the Washington Post, "The Pulitzer recognizes photography that many times goes unrecognized, and by recognizing it gives the reader a second chance to look more closely at the image and the story it tells." A family's joy in greeting a father returning from a prisoner of war camp in 1974 is visceral. Photographer Greg Gibson's 1993 image of former President Clinton talking with a small boy offers a special glimpse into the world of an American presidential campaign. Photographer John H. White, born in Lexington, North Carolina, received a Pulitzer in the feature photography category in 1982 for his photography portfolio covering a year in the life of Chicago for the Chicago Sun-Times. The NCSU Libraries is very pleased to present this stunning exhibition for the university community and for the general public. Admission to the exhibition is free, and copies of the catalog will be available for purchase.

Hungarian-born newspaper magnate Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911) established an endowment in 1904 to create the Pulitzer Prizes, which are awarded each year in the categories of journalism, literature, music, and drama. Pulitzer sought to foster excellence in his beloved profession of journalism, and the prestige accorded to the Pulitzer winners attests to the success of his intentions. The first Pulitzer Prizes were awarded in 1917. The Pulitzer board established a prize for photojournalism in 1942, and in 1968 the category was divided into awards for breaking news and for feature photographs. To qualify for nomination, photographs have to have been published in an American daily or weekly newspaper.

Exhibition curator Cyma Rubin (see Capture the Moment: The Pulitzer Prize Photographs), who graduated form NC State in 1947 with a degree in textile management, has led a distinguished career in the arts. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Friends of the Library at NC State. Rubin cowrote the exhibition catalog with Eric Newton of the Newseum in Arlington, Virginia. The catalog features photographs and biographies of the prize-winning photographers as well as interviews with many of the photographers. Rubin, a Broadway producer, also produced and directed "Moment of Impact: Stories of the Pulitzer Prize Photographs," an Emmy Award-winning TV documentary examining six Pulitzer photographs.

For further information regarding the exhibition, please call Linda McCormick (919-515-8120) or Bernard McTigue (919-515-8119) in the Libraries' Special Collections Department.