Peruvian photographer Martín Chambi : exhibition in Granada

Cuzco, Arequipa….As an adolescent, my dreams took me to South America. Dreams unfulfilled yet but this new exhibition in Granada on Peruvian photographer Martín Chambi will sustain me for a bit. I will go and see it next saturday.

This is what Chambi wrote on the occasion of an exhibition in Santiago in 1936

“I have read that in Chile it is thought that Indians have no culture, that they are uncivilized, that they are intellectually and artistically inferior when compared to whites and Europeans. More eloquent than my opinion, however, are graphic testimonies. It is my hope that impartial and objective witnesses will examine this evidence. I feel that I am a representative of my race; my people speak through my photographs.”

“He leido que en Chile se cree que los indios no tienen cultura, que son bárbaros que tienen una inferioridad mental y expresiva notables al lado de blancos y europeos. Pero me parece más elocuente que mi opinión, los testimonios gráficos. Me gustaria que los testigos imparciales y objetivos vieran este acervo….me siento como un representante de la raza; ella habla en mis fotografías”

I took these pictures of Chambi's portraits outside the exhibition center. How can you not stop and be fascinated by the expressions on the faces, the greatness of the landscape...