lost frames

“What’s it all mean?”

A photographic exhibition in progress, built from recovered vernacular photographs of life during the Vietnam War.

Lost Frames brings together photographs rediscovered from forgotten negatives made during the war—images of waiting, travel, brotherhood, and the quieter stretches of life in the shadow of war.

Made by U.S. soldiers, these personal photographs remained unseen for decades, their moments frozen in time within the negatives. Now recovered and printed again, they are being brought into the public eye for the first time.

Together, they form a fragmented and deeply personal record of the war, pieced together through the everyday moments of those who lived within it.

A question found etched into a helicopter by a soldier—“What’s it all mean?”—became a recurring idea throughout the exhibition. It asks what is lost, what survives, and what these photographs can still tell us about the lives held within them.

These lost frames—and the lives frozen within them—are part of what remains.

Part I: War As It Was Reported And Seen From Home.

Part II: War As It Was Lived In Vietnam.

Part III: Lynn Matteson- The Human Consequence

PREVIEW THE EXHIBIT

  • The photographs in Lost Frames begin as rediscovered vernacular negatives—ordinary, personal images made outside of war.

    Blurred, scratched, imperfect, or caught in passing, they preserve the quieter moments around war: travel, waiting, friendship, work, entertainment, and solitude. What once seemed ordinary now becomes a record of how war was lived.

    As images of conflict continue to fill our screens, Between Frames asks us to look beyond military history and toward its human cost.

    On one negative, a question is written across a helicopter:

    “What’s it all mean?”

    Decades later, the question remains.

  • Recovered from thousands of found and preserved negatives and photographs taken by U.S. servicemen in Vietnam, Lost Frames looks beyond the familiar images of war.

    These photographs do not depict combat. Instead, they capture the lives surrounding it—everyday life continuing under the shadow of conflict.

    Seen through the servicemen’s personal cameras, the images raise questions that official histories cannot answer.

    They remain suspended between duty and doubt, beauty and destruction, ordinary life and the forces that would forever alter it.

Archive

The research behind Between Frames.

Between Frames began with photographs and negatives separated from the people who made them.

The archive brings together the material surrounding the images, records and other traces used to understand where the photographs came from and what they contain.

Parallel Frames

Recovered 7-inch reel, approximately 400 feet, color Super 8 film, 1969

Filmed by a U.S. Air Force serviceman stationed at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, this rare amateur reel records fragments of life in and around Saigon during the Vietnam War.

The footage moves between crowded streets, regional flights, helicopters, crew gatherings, and moments of rest. It also documents civic work surrounding the construction and dedication of the Dieu Quang orphanage in 1969.

Seen decades later, these scenes carry a different weight. Everyday life continues around the machinery of conflict, while soldiers and civilians briefly occupy the same frame, each moving through the war with different understandings of why it was happening and what it would ultimately cost.

  • The Atlas Project- MAF Special Services Tape — Vietnam War Era

    This prerecorded reel, labeled “III MAF Special Services,” was part of the U.S. Marine Corps’ effort to bring music to troops stationed in Vietnam.

    Jazz—Wes Montgomery, Oscar Peterson, Ramsey Lewis—moved through base camps and rec tents, offering brief moments of calm, memory, and escape.

  • Seattle, Washington, 1969 (Draft Letter)

    Censored letters sent from city jail following a Vietnam War draft order.

    Marked, withheld, and returned, these documents trace a refusal and its consequence—revealing a parallel experience of the war shaped by resistance rather than service.

  • Olympus Pen EE Camera with Receipt and Film Materials

    DD Form 448 (Military Interdepartmental Purchase Request)
    Authorizing Officer: Cpt. Mark Soriano (MACVLS)
    Request for the purchase of an Olympus Pen 35mm camera ($27.99)

    This original document is preserved alongside the corresponding camera, its carrying case, and film canisters.

  • Voices on Tape (1967–1971)

    A group of ¼-inch reel-to-reel recordings made by a U.S. serviceman stationed in Vietnam.

    Using portable tape equipment, he documented fragments of daily life—spoken letters, conversations, music, and moments shared among friends.

    Preserved in their original boxes and labeled by hand.

  • The Cameras

    A selection of camera models in circulation during the Vietnam War, many carried by servicemen to document daily life.

    Produced across the 1930s through the early 1970s, these cameras reflect the range of tools available to individuals moving through both civilian and military life.

  • 8mm Film Reel, Vietnam, January 1967

    An exposed roll of 8mm film.

    As part of this archive project, the contents are being viewed for the first time—revealing a sequence of moments preserved and unseen for decades.

    What emerges offers a rare glimpse into daily life in Vietnam, carried forward from the instant it was captured.

  • Yashica Electro 35 G (circa 1968–1972, Jim Stanley)

    This camera was owned by Jim Stanley and carried with him in Vietnam. Like many servicemen, he used it to document everyday life—capturing personal moments beyond official record.

  • Kodak 35mm Slides of Base Life, Vietnam, Late 1960s–Early 1970s

    A set of 35mm slides capturing scenes of daily life on U.S. bases.

    Handwritten annotations along the mounts identify people, locations, and activities.

  • “Memory of South Viet-Nam” Photo Album, 1968–1971

    An album assembled by a U.S. serviceman, featuring approximately 90 photographs.

    Sequenced and titled at the time, it reflects an effort to shape memory through images. This album is part of a larger collection of personal photo albums in the archive, collectively documenting lived experience in Vietnam.

  • Fragments of a War (The photos)

    Thousands of loose photographs, in color and black and white, taken by U.S. servicemen during the Vietnam War. Removed from albums and separated from their original context, these images remain unsequenced and often unidentified.

    Together, they form an expansive but fragmented archive, where meaning emerges through accumulation. What is preserved is not a complete history, but a dispersed record of experience—held across thousands of images.

  • Unseen Negatives

    Over 400 photographic negatives, in color and black and white, produced by U.S. servicemen during the Vietnam War.

    Many have been separated from their original prints and remain unprinted since their initial development.

    Through this project, selected negatives frames are printed as silver gelatin photographs, allowing these images to re-emerge after decades out of view.

  • HOME MOVIE FOOTAGE — TAN SON NHUT & SAIGON (1968–1969)

    7-inch reel, ~400 ft, color 8mm film

    Recorded by a U.S. Air Force serviceman stationed at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, this reel captures fragments of daily life in and around Saigon during the Vietnam War. Though described as a pilot, Schott served as an air traffic controller—positioned at the edge of constant movement.

    The footage moves between Saigon street scenes, regional flights, and base life—crew gatherings, helicopters, and moments of leisure—alongside civic work, including the construction and dedication of the Dieu Quang orphanage in 1969.

  • Lynn Matteson

    A life assembled through what remains- Letters, photographs, awards, ephemera, and telegrams trace the life of Lynn Matteson from service to loss—and into the hands of those who carried his memory forward.

    His story unfolds through a sequence of telegrams: injury, updates, then confirmation. Each message changes what his family understands.

    Unlike many of the lives represented in Between Frames, Lynn’s story can be followed through what survived. He was nineteen.

    In 1969, his brother, Don Matteson of Kingston, New York, accepted the Air Medal on his behalf.