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"Can Suffering Be Too Beautiful?" (Salgado review)


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I think the NYTimes is a little too artsy-phartsy most of the time,

reading more into art than is there. Salgado's images are terrific to

be sure, and he captures the human condition brilliantly. (And with

an M to boot!) However, the esoteric musings of the NYTimes writer

were a little much for me. Why not just say "The images moved me

because..."? Instead he complains "-- They are too beautiful," and

then goes on to say "The show, like the book, includes too many

photographs that aren't up to his best." I don't know, maybe it's

just me being tired af critics always trying to sound sophisticated

and perhaps reading more into an artist's work than was originally

placed there by the artist.

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I had the oportunity to visit Salgados excibition "Workers" in Mexico

City few years ago, I was impresed by the quality of the expositoin,

his view as a photographer has a lot do with his experiences as a

economist; but what critics may disagree with his view as a

documentalist-photographer is how he never losses his way of seeing,

so he is not merely a documentalist but an artist, and represent

things as those impress him, and reality can be diferent that´s for

sure. So what´s documentalism?, and how ourown view as photographers

can be part of it?.

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Salgado's images will outlive him.

I don't think NYT's comment will outlive the paper it is written on

for too long.

Sometimes critics are at the artist's height and their comments help

us get an additional insight on the works they comment. IMHO this is

not the case.

 

<p>

 

-Iván

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Silly me, I actually thought that Michael Kimmelman's review was on

target. I think that there is a lot of "Salgado imitating Salgado"

photography in "Migrations" and most of the work in "The Children"

reflects its throwaway nature.

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