Step into the Ancient City of Palmyra at the Crow Museum of Asian Art – NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

A few years after the ancient city of Palmyra was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980, Carolyn Brown made the first of three trips to the Syrian site to photograph one of the greatest cultural centers of antiquity. Brown’s pictures of Palmyra, a poignant documentation of a cultural site destroyed by ISIS, are now on view through January 2nd at the Crow Museum of Asian Art at the University of Texas in Dallas in the Dallas Arts District.

Brown began photography while studying art history at the American University in Cairo. She bought a camera to photograph the Fatimid and Mamluk mosques in Cairo. Her love for ancient sites and her fascination for the photographic process inspired her trips to Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Turkey.

Carolyn Brown

Carolyn Brown with guide in Turkey before taking the bus to Palmyra for her first trip to the ancient site.

Traveling the Middle East in the 1980s was an adventure for Brown. Americans were popular, and as a Western woman, she was considered the third gender. “I was shown as much respect as a man,” said Brown.

When she first arrived in Palmyra, Brown was amazed at her limitless access to the ancient site. “To see it all distributed, there were no fences, no tourists, no guards. The bus drove right past the great arch, ”said Brown. “It wasn’t done very well. It was still going back to nature, which in my eyes is beautiful, instead of restoring something in such a way that you can’t recognize it. That was something very special. “

Carolyn Brown Palmyra Colonnade cyclist

Carolyn Brown

Palmyra Colonnade with Cyclists and Tetrapylon

On her second trip to Palmyra, she was a guest at the Cham Palace Hotels. The hotel was on the premises and she could easily leave her hotel in the early hours of the morning or later in the day for photo outings. Her images focus on the structures with just a few glances at human figures exploring the site or speeding through the ancient remains on a bicycle.

Brown worked with a tripod and cable release and composed her shots using medium format Hasselblad and Fuji panoramic equipment with multiple lenses. “I had to take several exposures to make sure I got one right because when I did this we didn’t have the option to retouch like now to bring out the colors of the contrasts. We just had to go with what we got, ”said Brown.

Photographed Carolyn Brown

Carolyn Brown

Carolyn Brown, pictured here at a church in Mexico in the 1990s, used a tripod and cable release to photograph Palmyra.

This exhibition shows 12 large format photographs of Palmyra. Brown’s collection of 7,500 photographs is now archived at the University of Texas at Dallas. “Your work really captures the humanity here, the humanity behind these buildings, behind this place and the history behind it,” said Dr. Michael Thomas, director of the Edith O’Donnell Institute at the University of Texas at Dallas and co-curator of this exhibition. “You can really think of this as this incredibly beautiful city that must have broken out of the desert as you approached it with many monumental buildings and a long history.”

Palmyra’s wealth caught the attention of many occupiers and eventually fell under the control of the Roman Empire. “Its location is an oasis and as early as the third millennium BC Chr [Before Common Era], it was a place of occupation. Because of its oasis, it has become a very important stop on the caravan routes through the Syrian desert, ”said Thomas.

Palmyra exhibit, Crow Museum of Asian Art Carolyn Brown

Carolyn Brown

The large format photos allow visitors to experience the vastness of Palmyra as well as the architectural details.

Brown’s photographs capture the intricate architectural details that suggest diverse cultural influences. “The buildings that you see and that Carolyn conquered very much represent her history as a Roman site,” said Thomas. “But they also have a lot of local characteristics. There are some architectural details that are not Roman and really come from the Middle Eastern architectural language. “

The panoramic photos make the city come alive, as if a visitor could step into the scene and stroll through the colonnaded streets. “These wonderful colonnaded streets are truly one of the great features of Palmyra, and for the most part unique. There are no such roads in other places, at least not to this extent, ”said Thomas. “What Carolyn does for a place is what a great portrait painter does for a person. She paints a portrait of these great places. “

Carolyn Brown Column Palmyra Temple of Bel

Carolyn Brown

Column capital from the Temple of Bel in Palmyra

ISIS captured Palmyra for the first time in 2015. The Baalshamin Temple and Bel Temple were blown up in August 2015. Khaled al-Assad, a renowned antiquarian, was beheaded when he refused to reveal the location of important artifacts. His body was hung on a pillar in the ancient site. The terrorist group used the city’s second-century Roman theater for public executions before demolishing part of the structure in 2017.

In contrast to Brown’s peace photography are the pictures of the New York Times photographer Bryan Denton. Denton only had a few hours to photograph the aftermath of Palmyra’s destruction.

This modern destruction makes Brown’s photographs even more important. “These are now really documents of this wonderful place that no longer exists. Much like we are trying to rebuild Notre Dame, I think there is an effort and desire in Syria to rebuild much of it and hopefully bring it back, ”said Thomas. “That was really one of the great national treasures of Syria.”

Carolyn Brown Crow Museum of Asian Art Panorama PalmyraCarolyn Brown

Carolyn Brown photographed the Palmyra cityscape in the 1980s, decades before the site was destroyed by ISIS.

Brown hopes her work will expand common understanding of the Middle East. “Like me, it just opens up the world and other cultures and other types of architecture and the country in the Middle East. I think most people only know about war and famine in the Middle East, ”said Brown. “I only did it because I loved it.”

Learn more: https://crowcollection.org/exhibition/carolyn-brown-and-palmyra-an-ancient-city-through-the-lens/

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