Valor No. 4

Valor No. 4

May 30 is Memorial Day in the United States, a special day for remembering those lost in service to their country.

The Iwo Jima Marine Corps Memorial sits on a gentle grassy hill in Arlington, Virginia, adjacent to the Arlington National Cemetery, across the Potomac from Washington, D.C.

The statue, by Austrian-born American sculptor Felix de Weldon, depicts five Marines and a U.S. Navy sailor raising an American flag on Mount Suribachi, Iwo Jima, after a bloody battle with Japanese forces in World War Two. It was actually inspired by a famous war-time photograph by Joe Rosenthal.

I had shot the Iwo Jima Memorial on previous occasions, but a 2013 project of narrating and producing a program (*) about it for VOA Learning English inspired me to return for some fresh images of it for the web site.

It also occasioned a newly awakened appreciation for the work of Felix de Weldon, as I feel the hours spent on that hill overlooking Washington enabled me to “see” the Iwo Jima statue, in ways I’d never seen it before.

Fortunately, the late September afternoon brought with it a frontal passage, allowing for some dramatic and rapidly changing skies which I felt set off the monument to good effect. My “Valor” series of images of the Iwo Jima Memorial are available in archival gallery prints and in a new range of custom printed note cards.

© Steve Ember

(*)https://soundcloud.com/steve-ember/podcast-this-is-america-iwo-jima-monument