The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation Announces Its New Division, 'The Gordon Parks Foundation' to Preserve the Legacy of Gordon Parks

The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation Announces Its New Division, 'The Gordon Parks Foundation' to Preserve the Legacy of Gordon Parks

The Gordon Parks Foundation Inaugural Awards Dinner Honoring Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Gloria Vanderbilt and HBO's Sheila Nevins to be held June 18, 2007

CHAPPAQUA, N.Y., May 23 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation (MKF) today announced that it has created a new division called The Gordon Parks Foundation, which will be dedicated to the preservation of photographer, author and film director Gordon Parks' ground-breaking creative work. Parks is known to many for his photo essays in Life magazine, his direction of the 1971 film Shaft, and for his autobiography The Learning Tree.

Parks was a poet, a composer and in 1969 became the first African American to direct a major Hollywood production, which was a film adaptation of The Learning Tree. Gordon Parks died in March 2006 and was a very close friend of MKF Founder and former Life magazine managing editor Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr., who died just two weeks later.

Parks and Kunhardt first met as colleagues at Life magazine in the early 1950s were they became close friends sharing the same passion for photography. Through the years their friendship grew and now their love of photography and the arts will be carried on through MKF and the Gordon Parks Foundation. The Gordon Parks Collection will be managed by Peter Kunhardt, the son of Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr.

"It is an honor to preserve the work and legacy of Gordon Parks who was not only an American treasure but a friend," said Peter Kunhardt, President of The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation. "I am pleased that my father's vast collection and his best friend's work will be preserved together."

"This is exactly what Gordon hoped for," said Gene Young, his former wife and executor of his estate. "His work will be in good hands and we are all going to work hard to make it available for future generations."

The Gordon Parks Foundation will host an inaugural awards dinner and auction, a celebration of his life and the arts, on Monday June 18. The event will honor scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr., artist Gloria Vanderbilt and Sheila Nevins, President of HBO Documentary Films.

The event will take place at 6:30 p.m. at Gotham Hall in New York City. Additional speakers include Richard D. Parsons, Chairman and CEO of Time Warner Inc.; designer Diane von Furstenberg; and Coca-Cola Senior Vice President Ingrid Saunders Jones. Anderson Cooper will serve as the Master of Ceremonies.

Honorary Co-Chairs are Muhammad Ali, President Bill Clinton, and Senator Hillary Clinton.

About The Gordon Parks Foundation

The Gordon Parks Foundation was created to preserve and perpetuate his legacy; support the work of others; and honor those whose contributions have advanced what Gordon Parks called, "the common search for a better life and better world."

About The Gordon Parks Foundation Award

The Gordon Parks Foundation Award is given to outstanding individuals whose work reflects four principles that Gordon Parks demonstrated throughout his life: courage, vision, compassion, and dignity.

The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation

The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation is a section 501(c)(3) New York State not- for-profit corporation dedicated to the preservation of photographs, film, and oral history and the use of it to inform, educate, and inspire. More information can be found at www.mkfound.org.

Source: The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation

CONTACT: Michelle Garceau, +1-347-738-0117, michelle.garceau@gmail.com,
for The Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation; or Diana Revson, +1-203-531-1058,
diana@gordonparksfoundation.org, of The Gordon Parks Foundation

Web site:

http://www.picturehistory.com/
http://www.mkfound.org/

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