[review-art] Magnum Exhibition- Access to Life

Magnum Exhibition: Access to Life

2011.11.23~2012.3.4

Hangaram Art Hall at the Seoul Arts Center

*About the Magnum Exhibition: 

"Magnum Photos is a photographic cooperative of great diversity and distinction owned by its photographer members. With powerful individual vision, Magnum photographers chronicle the world and interpret its peoples, events, issues and personalities.

The Magnum Photos library is a living archive updated daily with new work from across the globe. You may search or browse our 500,000+ images which are available online for licensing in a variety of formats." 
http://www.magnumphotos.com/ 
Led by Steve McCurry, a team of Magnum photographers went to AIDS-stricken places all over the world, meeting with AIDS patients and their families and capturing their lives through a camera lens. They returned 4 months later to the same people, or in some cases, the same peoples' graves. The regions covered are Hanoi, Vietnam (Steve McCurry) Haiti (Jonas Bendikssen) Mali (Paolo Pellegrin) Russia (Alex Majoli) India (Jim Goldberg) South Africa and Swaziland (Larry Towell) Peru (Eli Reed) and Rwanda (Gilles Peress). Though each photographer presented different ways to approach the topic and express their messages, the exhibition as a whole focused on visual storytelling- photo storytelling. "A photograph of the tragedy can change the tragedy"-with this message, the Magnum exhibition strives to speak of the AIDS tragedy to the world.

Steve McCurry- Hanoi, Vietnam

The Magnum exhibition was a heavy one for me, both because of the subject matter and also because I was trying hard to focus on each photograph and each section. It was interesting to see how the 8 different photographers took the same project and dealt with it in different ways, using different methods and different styles. Each photographer, I think, had the same three major themes of the subject matter in their minds, but the extent of each theme being expressed differed from photographer to photographer. These three most prevalent themes were (1) death (and the importance of life) (2) human relationships (3) social prejudice. Again, these three themes were dealt with in different amounts by each author—for example, Steve McCurry’s photographs showed the individual within a family, emphasizing the (2) human relationships and played with the idea of (3) social prejudice, but the images focused more on the (2) human relationships. In contrast, Jonas Bendiksen’s photographs (especially the self-portraits) focused on the individual and his/her journey to death, with almost no mention of human relationships and social prejudice.

Jim Goldgerg- India

It was also interesting to see how each photographer, recreated the relationship of the society and the individual of the different areas they were assigned to. Paolo Pellegrin, who was assigned to Mali, portrayed the dark home interiors and the individuals to show how the patients were isolated from society. Jim Goldberg’s photos from India, however, portray a much larger scope of a different society—a society where a strict caste system dominates everyday life, yet where a deadly disease has dared to upset the barriers that divide each caste. In his pictures, the individual is only part of the story—he tells of a larger story that encompasses the whole Indian society by telling the lives of his subjects.

Jonas Bendikssen- Haiti

Steve McCurry’s photographs focused on the family unit. His photographs showed everyday images of the family he was assigned to, and his subjects were not the individuals with AIDS, but their families as a whole. I liked how they were silent and observing, unobtrusive to the families at the other side of the camera, because it was this quality that made the images powerful.

Paolo Pellegrin- Mali

Paolo Pellegrin’s photographs seemed staged, which added to its powerfulness. The usage of light and shadow emphasized the photographer’s idea of the sanctity of life. The images had a mythical quality, especially the way they played with light and the colors. There were several photographs that stood out, including the photograph of a window with light pouring out of it, in front of which a woman was sitting. Because the background light was so bright, the woman’s body was nothing more than a shadow. I remember its vivid quality, especially the deep emerald green of the curtain that seemed to glow as light shined through it. The texture for some reason reminded me of the portraits done by Ingres. Traces of Ingres were also present in how the photographer captured the expressions of his subjects, especially in the close-up photo of a woman, with a focus on her eyes.

Eli Reed- Peru

Eli Reed in the photographer’s statement said that he focused on the human relationships of his subjects, particularly the ones between family and friends. One of the interesting characteristics visible in all of his photographs was that his subjects never made eye contact with the camera, choosing instead to look slightly off the camera or act as if the camera did not exist at all. Also, though he said that he focused on relationships, all of his photographs showed his subjects alone—none of his photographs showed his subjects in the midst of an interaction. His most interesting subject was a Peruvian cross-dresser who contracted AIDS. His photographs told the story of his recovery, and there was one particular photo that depicted the cross dresser sitting in a corner with two mirrors—the two mirrors created 4 planes within the photograph, quite literally portraying the parallel worlds the subject was entrapped in.

I think it was Jim Goldberg rather than Eli Reed who managed to deal with the themes of human relationships and social responsibilities through his photographs. Utilizing a mixture of portraits and statements written in his subjects’ own handwriting rendered in vivid colors, he emphasized that AIDS counteracts even the strictest of divisions among social classes. Even the invisible yet sturdy walls of the Indian caste system were not concrete enough to limit the strike of AIDS to a lower class. This message was reinforced through his pictures, which depicted his subjects in their ordinary settings. He also utilized a ‘moving portrait’ which was a short video clip showing his subjects staring into the camera. These moving portraits reminded me of the portraits done by Ingres, because unlike photographs these moving portraits showed a fuller and perhaps more complete image of the subjects. Though I did not find them as striking as I surmised they were meant to be, they were different from the flash moment a photograph captures.

Gilles Peress - Rwanda

Gilles Peress contributed a slideshow of Rwandan AIDS victims that was accompanied by a recording of a song sung by his subjects. The sheer quantity of the pictures, and the speed at which the pictures transitioned stopped the audience from mulling over each picture as they had done for previous authors’ works. Instead, it was effective in its way of ‘subtle storytelling,’ which effectively communicated the overall atmosphere of the country captured in his lens. Larry Towell’s exhibition space was similar, drawing the audience directly into the land he captured by using no frames on his pictures and dotting the walls with handwritten quotes along with everyday objects taken from the subjects’ homes. This was fitting with his artists’ statement, in which he said that the photographer’s role is to watch those with power by spending time with the powerless. He literally takes his audience into the lives of his subjects, making his audience spend time with the powerless. Alex Majoli used a similar technique, but his exhibition space was very different in that it was very calculated. The frames, the wall color, even the spaces between the frames were carefully considered in his attempt at visual storytelling—which was very different from the free attempt used by Peress in his subtle storytelling method.

Alex Majoli- Russia

Larry Towell- South Africa and Swaziland