Two photographic universes, two approaches, two epochs but a common admiration, passion for the Peruvian culture.
While individual or group portraits of Martin Chambi (Coaza, 1891 – Cuzco, 1973) explore and reveal the complexity of the Peruvian society of the early 20th century, its countryside daily life scenes with its peasants are deeply tinged with the poetry, which comes from Inca culture’s remains.
First native photographer, Chambi was simultaneously anthropologist, art show photographer, photojournalist, militant witness of the birth of the Indian movement in his country, archivist of his own culture and of his country’s folklore…He’s now known as one of the genius of photography, for his technical skills, his work on light and his sense of frame.
Juan Manuel Castro Prieto (Madrid, 1958), who discovered Peru in 1990 on the footsteps of Martin Chambi, developed along his numerous trips a more contemporary approach of this world, without exoticism, underlining the frailty of reality and memory. A really different way of working from Chambi’s one. The persistent conflict between the contemporary iconography polluted by globalization’s symbols and the imperial past’s traces is the aim of Castro-Prieto’s work, which is also a tribute to Chambi’s work.
