ABSENT FRIEND

SEAN FLYNN

our ‘Absent Friend’ – we salute and honour a man whose heritage was Tasmanian. He was the son of actor, Errol Flynn. He disappeared while on a photographic assignment on April 6th 1970 near Chi Pou in Eastern Cambodia. An early victim of the Khmer Rouge. Sean only saw his father fourteen times and went to Vietnam to find himself, in the process he became a proficient photographer in the way that °SOUTH emulates. The excellence of image in conflict, compassion and clarity is documentation. In death Sean has become a legendary figure whose work is largely unknown, in life he was determined to become a serious photojournalist but living beneath the giant shadow of his father was to become his great burden. He had tried acting and appeared in 7 ‘B’ grade films.

He taught himself to use a camera and his images appeared in TIME-LIFE, PARIS MATCH and others. He also covered the Six Day War and along with TIM PAGE was a part of the ‘band of brothers’ who lived in the infamous ‘Frankie’s House’.

Sean a lost Australian son would be quietly proud that he made his name not as a ‘B’ grade actor but as a very good photojournalist whose images are now held by the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.