Dan Eldon: The Art of Life

Only 22 when he lost his life on assignment in Somalia, photojournalist Dan Eldon left behind much more than the journals that became the basis for Chronicle's best-seller The Journey Is the Destination. He left a lifetime of adventures that continue to inspire. Raised in Kenya, he took numerous expeditions across Africa that helped him to understand and love the continent. Through his safaris and benevolent crusades--and with interludes of study and work in the US and London, and trips around the world--he crafted a philosophy of curiosity, creativity, adventure, and charity. Intensely visual, like the life it describes, Dan Eldon: The Art of Life is more than a biography. It is an exploration of one man's will to take in everything life has to offer; an example of a life lived for art, and art experienced as lif

Only 22 when he lost his life on assignment in Somalia, photojournalist Dan Eldon left behind much more than the journals that became the basis for Chronicle's best-seller The Journey Is the Destination. He left a lifetime of adventures that continue to inspire. Raised in Kenya, he took numerous expeditions across Africa that helped him to understand and love the continent. Through his safaris and benevolent crusades--and with interludes of study and work in the US and London, and trips around the world--he crafted a philosophy of curiosity, creativity, adventure, and charity. Intensely visual, like the life it describes, Dan Eldon: The Art of Life is more than a biography. It is an exploration of one man's will to take in everything life has to offer; an example of a life lived for art, and art experienced as lif

Publishers Weekly

Eldon's powerful photographs of the escalating war in Somalia were instrumental in bringing international attention to that troubled region, and he seemed poised on the brink of an important career as a Reuters photojournalist when, in 1993, at the age of 22, he was stoned to death by a Somali mob. The posthumous The Journey Is the Destination, based on his journals, was one of the most enthusiastically received books of 1997. Eldon's youthful mastery of a fluid and vibrant collage style derived in part from the similar journals of Peter Beard, but charged with originality fully justified their publication. New's biography allows for a further selection from Eldon's 17 volumes of journals, which fittingly dominate the text both visually and thematically. Unfortunately, Eldon was in many ways a typical young man, confused, temperamental and capricious, if extraordinarily driven, and the hagiographic tone of this book is at odds with the details of his life. It is very hard to resist the temptation to make a cult of those who die young and full of promise, a temptation that New, an educational consultant in Iowa City, does not always avoid. And even granting the intrinsic interest of the journals, they are still clearly the apprentice work of someone who would have gone on to further discourses. (Oct.) Forecast: As the flipside to the young, introspective collagistes like Sabrina Ward Harrison (Brave on the Rocks, etc.), Eldon's life and work set an example of engagedness that might be tough to emulate, but should inspire younger readers. A film is in the works. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Jennifer New escaped big-city life a few years ago to return to her hometown of Iowa City, where she runs an educational consulting business with her husband. She writes non-fiction for local and national publications.

Kathy Eldon is co-producing both a feature film about her son's life and a documentary about journalists who put their lives at risk to tell a story. She lives in Los Angeles.