Eddie Agams' 1968 Nguyen Ngc Loan executing Nguyen Van Lem.

(In that way it’s not like watching a colorized movie on TCM, where you have no reference to the original.) Granted, I’ve seen the colorized versions put up on web sites on their own this week, but that wasn’t Dullaway’s intent.
     Once you understand this as an exercise, I think it’s fascinating to see how we respond to the colorized images. The best ones come alive, dissolving the distance between past and present. You notice different things: the clear blue sky in the Adams image, dirt on the kids’ necks in the Lange image. You’re engaging with the photograph in a new, interesting way.
     In all the noise this week, one thing that wasn’t being heard was Dullaway’s voice. I was intrigued to see what her intent was in colorizing these images, and how she felt about the reactions, so I contacted her over email. She was cheerful and responsive, eager to set the record straight as she spoke about the media attention, the criticism and the act of colorizing history.

You’re a very good colorist. How did you learn your skills?
The technique is available for everyone: Color Mode in Photoshop. My sense of color and lighting is self-taught, I’ve never taken any art classes. I’ve been a hobby photographer for years and I think that’s where I “learned” how colors work in photographs. For example grass is not only green, it is lit up in the yellow warm sunlight and toned down in the shadows’ blue tones.