UPPER WEST SIDE — As the wife of a New York City firefighter, Judy Jonas has seen her fair share of 9/11 exhibits. To her, "Faces of Ground Zero — 10 Years Later" ranks among the best.
The series of life-size portraits of firefighters, rescue workers and ordinary people affected by 9/11 were created by photographer Joe McNally in the weeks and months following the attacks. To mark the 10th anniversary, McNally updated 24 of the portraits and shot video interviews with some of his subjects.
The works are on display at the Time Warner Center through Sept. 12, 2011.
"In looking at the pictures, you could see that moment in time," said Jonas, whose husband, John Jonas, was captain of FDNY's Ladder 6 on 9/11. "You could see the expression of either grief, or relief, or frustration, and that tentantiveness. You can't go back in time and capture that expression."
Jonas's husband was among the people McNally photographed 10 years later.
On 9/11, he led members of Ladder 6 — known as the "miracle company" — to the 27th floor of the north tower, where they heard and felt the south tower collapse. When the North Tower fell, he and his men were trapped inside. All survived and rescued Port Authority worker Josephine Harris.
John Jonas, who was promoted to battalion chief five days after 9/11, stood on Wednesday in front of his updated portrait on the second floor of the Time Warner Center as his wife talked about how the first five years following the attack felt like "turmoil."
She slowly learned to cope with the feelings from that day.
"You don't forget it, you integrate it into your life," she said. "And you make sure you live your life better."
Judy Jonas said she likes the new photographs because they show an evolution of healing and grieving in their subjects' faces. "It's good to see in the new pictures that people are functioning," Jonas said. "Some aren't. For some people, it's still Sept. 12."
Part of the exhibit's power comes from the fact that it captures the breadth of people affected by 9/11.
Prominent figures such as Mayor Rudy Giuliani are pictured alongside ironworkers who cleaned up the World Trade Center site, a fighter pilot who flew to Manhattan to intercept possible hostile aircraft in the minutes following the attack and the weeping sister of a firefighter killed in the attack.
"They're average people, the way you and I are average people," McNally said. "They're New Yorkers on the street. It's that old truism. Ordinary people are capable of extraordinary things."
