One of our favorite art shows of last year was Portland artist Harrell Fletcher’s The American War, which came to Portland as part of PICA’s TBA06. Here’s part of what I wrote after seeing the show in the fall:

The American War is, at its simplest, an exhibition of copy photographs from the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City. Fletcher brought his digital camera to the museum over several visits and took photos of the graphic and highly disturbing pictures on the walls there—images of massacred body parts, defoliated forests, and grotesquely deformed victims of Agent Orange. As a Work of Art, The American War isn’t wildly impressive. But I don’t think Fletcher’s goal was to create a body of Fine Art photographs. In fact, his stated mission was “to bring the experience of the museum to the US population,” which he certainly achieved. The American War is a profound sight that reminds us not only of the graphic horrors of war, but that there are (at least) two sides to every story.

Harrell wrote us this morning to let us know that he has begun to write occasionally for The Huffington Post. His first entry, which went up today, is about the American War project and how the war in Iraq is and isn’t like the Vietnam War. Read the post at the link above, or see the American War here. (Advisory: It’s fairly graphic at times.)