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Mike,
Thanks. The Haitian portrait is one that gets alot of comments from visitors to the collection. There was a thread posted I was reading a few days ago asking about pastel techniques. I'll post it there with comments about how I created it.
Yes, most of the works were composed of a combination of photos taken and sketches drawn on site. I also carried a watercolor kit with me to take color notes that I felt the camera just couldn't capture.
As far as assignments, it was whatever was hot at the time. Whether it was Rwanda, Haiti, or Bosnia. Kind of like a war art correspondent, I guess. "Hey Snyder, grab your stuff, you're going to Panama next week to capture as much as you can of the Cuban refugee camps there. Bring everything back and create about 40 - 50 works on it or whatever you deem necessary." That sort of thing. As far as the work itself, no one ever dictated what images I should paint or was I ever censored.
There were a few voluntary assignments as well. Looking through the collection, I saw that there very few training images - most were mission related. So I volunteered to go to Air Assualt School, learn to jump out of helicopters on a rope, and then I stuck around for a few more weeks to observe the next class coming through and document their experience. Going through and experiencing the course first hand added that "extra punch" to the work. I feel it is the strongest work I produced as an Army artist.
Thanks for your reply and I look forward to talking again.
Gene
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