‘nostalgia is so yesterday’: david hume kennerly and charles jennings talk politics and their collaboration of photos and poetry in advance of june 1 event • oregon artswatch

David Hume Kennerly and Charles Jennings met 40 years ago and the close friends have been creating work together ever since. Both nearly 80 years old, Kennerly, prolific Pulitzer

Prize-winning photographer and photojournalist, and Jennings, best-selling writer and journalist, have no intention of taking it slow. Their newest book, a captivating collection of

photographs and poetry, will be featured this weekend during a special event called _Nostalgia Is So Yesterday_. The night of dark humor, poetry, storytelling, and music is put on by Cygnet

Salon and will take place on Sunday, June 1, at TOC Concert Hall in Downtown Portland. Earlier this week, I spoke with Kennerly and Jennings, who told me they love working together and will

use the event to express their offbeat senses of humor and ways of thinking. Kennerly plans to talk about his years in the business, highlighting the chaos and “unconscionable behavior”

happening in politics today. He will showcase photos from an era in which, he says, politicians got along without condemning one another for their varying points of view. The photos will

feature well-known figures who managed to “disagree with each other without being disagreeable,” Kennerly said, quoting President Gerald R. Ford, for whom he acted as Chief Official White

House Photographer from 1974-1977. “I want to talk about how you could be civil. It’s like a time capsule of civility,” he explained. Later in the evening, Portland-area actors Bruce

Burkhartsmeier, David Meyers, Vana O’Brien, and Kathleen Worley will bring Jennings’ poems to life, followed by a reading of a newly written poem that Jennings says “reflects this time in

contemporary America.” Jennings, whose poetry Kennerly refers to as “real American poetry with an Irish veneer,” is drawn to collecting inspiration from the classical. “Charles’ background

and the family history are all about poetry,” Kennerly said, “and how his vision comes out through words … mine comes out through photographs. That’s why I think people will really enjoy the

event. It’s going to be the first and last episode of this epic thing we’re doing.” When I chatted with them, Kennerly and Jennings shared a magnetic comfortableness. Their stories

interwove, a contagious light illuminating their eyes when they laughed at each other’s jokes and built off each other’s responses. Their camaraderie was a welcoming glimpse into the event

to come, elaborating on the incredible moments in history they had witnessed. Sponsor “I could probably do a book of scary moments,” Kennerly said about the highs and lows of his career. “I

didn’t think I would see my 25th birthday. I went to Vietnam when I was 24 years old and spent most of the time in the field, covering combat. I had a lot of close calls during that period,

when I covered the India-Pakistan war, and covering action in Cambodia and Vietnam. So when I made it to 25, that was a big deal. It’s almost like every day after that has been a plus for

me. And when I turned 50, I felt like I hit a double. When I turned 75 three years ago, I hit a triple. So I don’t complain about getting older. When you ask me how I’m doing, I don’t tell

you that my arm hurts or something. I’m happy to be here, and I’m still taking photographs.” “You know,” he continued, “there have been a lot of singular moments that were frightening, but

overall, I got through it. That was the most important thing. And there are so many good moments, too, that I can’t even recount them. If you look at the photographs, you’ll see a

combination of joy in other people, which reflects how I live my life. I’m a very upbeat person, and I believe that good things will happen, but I’m not delusional.” In addition to the

collaborative book with Jennings, Kennerly is working on another photography book, slated for 2026 from publisher Rizzoli.  “I’m just in the midst of it right now. It’s 60 years of my

photographs, and the working title is _On the Front Lines of History_,” Kennerly said. “It’s pretty overwhelming. It’s hard to believe that anybody could have been at so many of these

stories. And in a way, even though I know I did it, it’s still hard to believe that I was the one.… I’m from a lumber town called Roseburg, Oregon, the timber capital of the nation, or it

used to be. My dad was a traveling salesman. To go from Roseburg to the White House, to staying in palaces of kings and queens around the world, and photographing all these people.… It’s a

real American story.” Tickets to the event, featuring book signings by the authors, are still available. Limited edition Kennerly prints will also be sold at the show. The limited-edition,

signed, and numbered 1966 images feature Mick Jagger and Miles Davis. Any overflow proceeds will go to TOC Concert Hall (The Old Church) and the Oregon Historical Society. I spoke with

Kennerly and Jennings about the show and their careers. Their responses have been lightly edited for length and clarity. *** Sponsor OREGON ARTSWATCH: HOW DID YOU GET INTO PHOTOGRAPHY,

WRITING, AND POETRY, AND WHEN DID YOU KNOW YOU WANTED THESE TO BE YOUR CAREER PATHS? JENNINGS: David and I are very different in this respect. David always knew precisely what he wanted to

do. He’s always been a photographer, first and foremost. I’ve done a lot of different things. I guess I have a shorter attention span, or I get bored more easily, but I’ve worked as a writer

— which is my first love — worked in film, produced a number of movies, started a few tech companies just to make sure I didn’t miss out on anything fun, and in the latest part of my

career, I’ve been a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council on AI policy. Not your normal poet’s resume. But through it all, I have had a love of poetry and I find that it satisfies me in a

way that nothing else does. So I’ve been writing poetry and was first published when I was 14 years old. I can still remember it was a rather bad poem about teenage values. But I’ve kept

writing, mostly filling up notebooks and putting them in the closet until the pandemic. Then I decided that instead of knitting or taking up marathon running, I would focus deeply on poetry.

And I wrote a book, sent it to David, and he said, “Man, this book could use some pictures.” So we started working on a project of trying to pair one of my poems with one of his pictures,

and we did it in a very serious way, investing a lot of time in it. We came up with this idea of doing a show, and it’s gained momentum. I think it’s going to be a great night of theater.

KENNERLY: I was born in Roseburg. I had my first published photograph in the high school newspaper when I was a sophomore in 1963, and graduated in ‘65 from West Linn High. But Charles is

right, I’ve known from a young age that I wanted to be a photographer. I wanted to show people things that they were never going to see. And so my whole career has been about that. My first

professional job was for_ _The Oregon Journal, which is no longer around. I was 19 years old and a staff photographer. The big event for me was covering Robert Kennedy one night as an

assignment, and then following him out to the airport and watching this other photographer, a Life magazine guy by the name of Bill Eppridge, get on the plane with him. The door closed and

the plane took off, and that’s when I decided I wanted to be on that airplane. I wanted to go where the action was, with the people who were making it happen, and I’ve never stopped. I got

on the plane with Robert Kennedy in ‘68 and covered the campaign for UPI. I was there the night he got shot at the Ambassador Hotel. But my career has been, as Charles would tell you, sort

of nonstop news. DAVID, YOU’RE FROM PORTLAND AND BASED IN LOS ANGELES. CHARLES, WHERE DID YOU GROW UP? JENNINGS: Central Valley, California, in a small farm town called Lemoore. I worked in

cotton fields, cotton gins, and peach canneries, which were a very important part of my education. I worked with a lot of what we call braceros, the migrant Mexican farm workers who would

come in for the season and go back every year. Nobody had a problem with it at the time. Then I went to school in San Francisco and Berkeley, and I stayed in college a little longer than

David. I think David was there for 20 minutes. I joke that I was there for an hour and a half. Sponsor My last class in college was at the University of California, Berkeley. I was taking a

classics course where we were studying Cicero’s orations, and the National Guard burst in with their tear gas canisters. This was the peak of the People’s Park era of UC Berkeley, and we all

had to run. I remember that, even in that moment, we had a good laugh about our classics professor trying to run across the big quad. And I just kept running, and never went back to school.

  After that, I worked at newspapers as a reporter and went on to write my first book in 1977. I’ve written seven since, all nonfiction. I wrote my most recent book on AI in 2018, but I’ve

written about various things and kept writing poetry along the way. WHERE DID YOUR LOVE OF POETRY BEGIN? JENNINGS: My love of poetry started with my Irish grandfather. He was born in Ireland

and would bounce me on his knee, singing me Irish ditties, limericks, and poems. Some were serious, but many more were of the lighter variety. And I started getting little rhymes and

limericks in my head, probably at age 5. AND THE TWO OF YOU MET DOING THE _CYCLING THROUGH CHINA_ FILM? KENNERLY: I was in the film, and I shot stills for them. JENNINGS: It was an

entertainment adventure for the Disney Channel, and it aired extensively on CCTV, reaching many more people than it did on the Disney Channel. This was the early days of cable, and David was

our celebrity photographer, and his job was to take pictures. These were some famous TV and film actors of the time, and David was in the mix then, and we just became buddies through that

experience. Sponsor KENNERLY: We’ve done a lot of things over the years together, I wrote and produced a movie —  a pilot for NBC about Vietnam photographers — that Alan Ruck was in. Helen

Hunt was also in it. They were going to make it into a series, and we shot it in Thailand. Charles was the line producer on the film. I was executive producer and writer, and the story was

based on my days as a Vietnam photographer, and the film won an Emmy for Best Cinematography. It didn’t get picked up as a series, but it was quite an adventure. I was very pleased with the

end result of it, but Charles and I have had many adventures, and it’s all culminating Sunday night at The Old Church. HOW WAS IT WORKING WITH THE OTHER MUSICIANS AND ACTORS ON THIS PROJECT?

KENNERLY: It’s been fantastic. Louanne Moldovan, our director, who’s been around for 30 years in Portland, has done a great job. JENNINGS: Louanne has added her little bit of magic to it,

where these poems are not just being read, they’re being performed in ways that both blow my mind and excite me. These poems are coming to life. Poetry is a very solitary activity. It’s not

just that you’re alone, but that you’re alone while trying to discover things about yourself … “revealing yourself to yourself,” said Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney. So it’s going to be a

lively night, and we call it “irreverent.” “Elder art” is our art form, and emphasis on irreverence is what we do, often trying to bust up stereotypes. WE TALKED A BIT ABOUT POLITICS

EARLIER. WILL YOU SHARE A SHORT THOUGHT ABOUT THE STATE OF AMERICA AND AMERICAN POLITICS TODAY? IS THERE ANY HOPE FOR US? KENNERLY: You know, I was in the Vietnam War. I was at Jonestown. I

mean, I shot the Kool-Aid — literally. And I think I’ve always been pretty optimistic, but I’ve also been realistic. I think I tried to find the best of stuff. It’s hard to find the best of

anything nowadays, especially with the way people speak to each other. It’s the chainsaw mentality now — among people cutting jobs of real people — and it’s a bad time being painted as a

necessary step. In politics, as Jon Meacham put it, “All the politicians used to play between the 40-yard lines,” which means that no one was that far apart in terms of how they wanted to do

things. Now it’s become polarized. I do think it’ll swing back, I really do. The worst period we had in this country, as far as I’m concerned, was the Civil War, which none of us were

obviously around for. But the divisiveness is going to slowly go away. If that doesn’t happen, we’re going to end up in a position of having a dictator running this country. We don’t have

many options but to return to a fairly normal state. Sponsor I just got off the phone with Liz Cheney a little while ago. We spoke for an hour, and she’s working on another book. She’s one

of the most courageous people in American politics now. She gave a talk in Portland for the Oregon Historical Society not too long ago, and her message is really one of hope, optimism, and

courage. She knew she was going to lose her congressional seat when she went up against Trump, but she chose not to let that stop her. So many people have hidden in the shadows, watching the

country go off the edge of the cliff. But I don’t think we’ll end up there. JENNINGS: I’ll sum up my view very quickly. My last poem is about the importance of courage in these times.

DAVID, YOU MENTIONED JONESTOWN. WILL YOU TALK A LITTLE ABOUT JONESTOWN AND CULTS? KENNERLY: Watching that was the worst-case outcome of cultish behavior, where people not only killed

themselves … but what gets overlooked is that they killed around 300 kids there. I saw their bodies, and that was the most shocking thing about it, that anybody could get to that point where

you would follow some crazy guy off the edge. One of my favorite cartoons of all time is called _What Lemmings Think_. And it shows lemmings’ thoughts as they’re running toward the cliff,

imagining they’ll soar and fly off into the air as opposed to what really happens to them. I could see that at Jonestown. Even after two years of Vietnam and covering other wars, it was

horrifying and inexplicable. There was no way to rationally deal with that. I had to walk around among the bodies, and when you’ve seen something like that, and look at what’s going on now,

it’s difficult. It’s the fact that you follow some charismatic leader to a place where you do harm to others or yourself, and as someone who’s never followed anybody, I don’t understand

that. How could you change your mind or have been influenced in a way where you would do something like that? It’s hard for me to understand, and I watched the aftermath and collateral

damage. There’s no way to have seen anything worse than what I saw. YOU’VE BOTH HAD SUCH LONG AND EXTENSIVE CAREERS. WHAT HAS BEEN A FAVORITE MOMENT THAT STANDS OUT TO YOU, AND WHAT HAS BEEN

ONE OF THE MOST FRIGHTENING OR CHALLENGING MOMENTS? KENNERLY: Well, the most frightening moment recently was watching Trump beat Kamala Harris — I was at her election night party in New

York City — because I cover this stuff, and knew this is a really bad omen. My big problem with it, as a practitioner of the First Amendment, was in part watching the press corps, mainly

writers and reporters, being demeaned on an hourly basis. That is detrimental for the country. It was also knowing what happened the first time around, and that this is going to be worse.

It’s definitely proving to be. Sponsor JENNINGS: One very interesting day that comes to mind was very gratifying. In 2000, Simon & Schuster published my book _The Hundredth Window_. It

was kind of a big deal, translated into five languages and so forth. In those days, the publishers used to really promote the books. They set me up in New York City for a day of local radio

interviews — six hours straight, just switching back and forth with all these live interviews across the country. It was such a fascinating experience. The book was basically on this new

phenomenon called “the internet” and some of the cautionary tales that I felt needed to be told. The experience was such a mosaic of America, and we went down all these different paths and

points of interest. I felt that that was a day that I just inhaled America. I remember, at the end of it, feeling exhilarated and exhausted. And I went down and had a martini or two.

CHARLES, DO YOU HAVE ANY FAVORITE POETS THAT YOU CAN RECOMMEND? JENNINGS: Two Oregon poets who have been very influential to me are William Stafford and Gary Snyder. I like to think I have a

little of each in me…. I’m a big fan of Yeats and Heaney, two famous Irish poets. In fact, Yeats is quoted in the show, and I have a reference to Heaney that nobody will get, except maybe

you. But also in the writer category … Oscar Wilde. DAVID, I’VE HEARD THIS QUOTE OF YOURS SHARED A COUPLE OF TIMES… “IN PHOTOGRAPHY, EVERYTHING CAN BE TAUGHT EXCEPT HOW TO SEE.” CAN YOU

ELABORATE ON THAT? KENNERLY: It’s like in poetry: Everything can be taught except how to write poems. You can grasp the technical aspects, but you can’t teach how you see it. Photography and

poetry are really the same thing. If there are 10 photographers lined up side by side, everybody will take a different picture, which is one of the beauties of it all. I mean, I could teach

you how to take pictures technically — and it’s way easier now with all the automatic cameras and exposure. I can’t tell you how to see something in a way that makes you produce a good

picture. You really have to have that coming from inside. I think I was really lucky with that from the get-go. When I got that first job at The Oregon Journal, I was a temp hire to replace

somebody who was in the military for six months. When he came back, the publisher of the paper called me into his office. I thought he would say, “OK, it’s been great, kid.” But he told me

that he thought I’d done such a good job that he wanted to offer me a full-time job. That guy was William Knight. JENNINGS: Let me tell you a story about David and his seeing. Over the

years, I’ve had the chance to talk to a lot of his fellow photographers. And there was a little sense of the competitive side, like, “How come Kennerly gets all these shots, and how’s he

always get in the room?” David always has a great talent for just getting in there. The other part of it, though, was a respect for the way David sees the picture even before it’s shot. 

Sponsor I remember one story, where George W. Bush and Michelle Obama had a moment. She may have put her head on his shoulder. There were probably 20 photographers there, and it happened in

front of all of them, and David somehow was the only one who got it. He has a unique capability to envision the picture, to see what he wants, and somehow get it that way. AND DAVID, WHO ARE

SOME OF YOUR FAVORITE PHOTOGRAPHERS THAT PEOPLE SHOULD CHECK OUT? KENNERLY: Ansel Adams was one, and I knew him very well. I did the Time magazine cover of Ansel. He’s the only photographer

who’s ever been on the cover of Time, and he and I were close. I’m also a trustee of the Ansel Adams Publishing trust. He was a combination of an environmentalist and a great photographer,

and also a great human being. He was one of my favorite people of all time. We have also lost a great photographer, Sebastião Salgado, whom I knew, who died two days ago. There was a big

obit in the New York Times yesterday about him.  Wow, there are just so many great photographers. Elliott Erwitt, who photographed people and animals, always with a wry eye. His photographs

conveyed his sense of humor. You can’t be a boring person and take humorous pictures, because pictures really reflect who you are. By the way, my archives are at the Center for Creative

Photography at the University of Arizona. In that archive, there are tons of great photographers… Richard Avedon, Edward Weston, W. Eugene Smith, Garry Winogrand, Ansel Adams…. Ansel started

it 50 years ago this year. It’s a great repository of American photographers, and I’m really happy to be part of it. IS THERE ANYTHING ELSE THAT YOU’D LIKE TO SHARE WITH READERS? Sponsor

KENNERLY: I’m staying at the Hotel Lucia, which features, in every room and every hallway, photographs that I took. I think there are over 700 of my pictures. So when I go there, it’s like

going home. I know so many people who have stayed there, then called me and said, “Do you know you have all these pictures in this hotel?” So I’d like to thank them. And don’t miss one of

our featured musicians, Nick Kennerly, appearing for the first time this year at the Oregon Country Fair.