Hubert Van Es (1941)
Netherlands
Biography :
"Born on July 6, 1941 in Hilversum, the Netherlands, the young Hubert (known as Hugh) Van Es decided to follow the path of war reporter Robert Capa after seeing an exhibition of his work. He began his career as a photojournalist in 1959 at the Nederlands Foto Persbureau in Amsterdam. Eight years later, he works freelance in Hong Kong. After a brief stint at the daily South China Morning Post and as a sound recordist for the television channel N.B.C. News in Vietnam, in 1969 he joined the Associated Press agency team in Saigon. That same year, he photographed the repatriation of a wounded soldier, which would become the symbol of the Battle of Hamburger Hill and allow American society to become aware of the reality of the conflict. From 1972, he covered the Vietnam War for United Press International (U.P.I.). This is how he took his most famous photo on April 29, 1975 in Saigon, from the U.P.I offices. : on the eve of the capitulation of the city, he captures on film the evacuation, by a CIA helicopter, of several dozen people crowded on a roof, thus testifying to the American debacle at the end of the World War Vietnam. While many people will wrongly believe that he photographed the American embassy in Saigon, the image actually shows an apartment building where the head of the CIA and most of his employees lived. Before the end of 1975, Van Es moved to Hong Kong, where he would spend the rest of his life. He then traveled across Asia and reported on conflicts such as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Muslim Moro rebellion in the Philippines. He died on May 15, 2009 in Hong Kong."
(Source, website, Universalis)