Symposium to feature Chinese photojournalist Wang Wenlan

A University of Iowa symposium highlighting the evolution of photojournalism will coincide with the opening of a new exhibit.

'From Local to Global - Photojournalism in the New Millennium,” from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday, will feature international photographers and scholars including Wang Wenlan, a senior photographer at China Daily in Beijing.

The photo exhibit 'Depicting Post-Revolutionary China: The Photojournalism of Wang Wenlan” will open Friday as well.

University of Iowa journalism professor and exhibition curator Judy Polumbaum said the event is a personal project. Polumbaum, who has been teaching for 26 years, is the daughter of the late Ted Polumbaum, who was a freelance journalist for 40 years.

'I grew up in a wet darkroom,” Polumbaum said. 'My dad died at the beginning of the dawning of the digital age. Without a doubt if he'd lived longer he would have gone whole hog into it.”

Polumbaum said she has watched the digital transition as a professor and lover of photojournalism.

'Still photography is an opportunity for people to pause and really look, and pay attention and ask themselves questions about what are these images that we are now bombarded with ... and how do they reflect a changing world?” Polumbaum said.

Polumbaum has known Wenlan for 35 years. The two began working together at the same time for what then was an English-language newspaper in Beijing, Polumbaum said.

Wenlan is a native of Beijing who began his career as an army photographer in the 1970s.

Wenlan's photos 'convey labor and leisure, solitude and companionship, routine and surprises and the endurance of tradition,” according to a news release.

'He was an amazing photographer and so he has had basically a 40-year career in which he's documented his society,” Polumbaum said.

Other speakers at Friday's symposium include David Guttenfelder, a National Geographic fellow; Jonathan Woods, senior photo and multimedia editor at Time magazine; and Marji Guyler-Alaniz, an Iowa photographer and creator of the FarmHer project.

Anthropologists Rubie Watson and Maris Gillette Boyd will present photographic portrayals of China from the 1920s into the 1940s and Wayne Xing, a historian and journalist, will present the work of sociologist Sidney Gamble, who also has photographed daily life in China, according to a news release.

Admission to the symposium is free; lunch is included. To reserve a spot, email caps@uiowa.edu with 'Photo program” in the subject line.

The free exhibit of Wenlan's work will be open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday until May 12 and by appointment in the Resource Center Gallery in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, E350 Adler Journalism Building.