Photography<\/a> in New York will present Graciela Iturbide: Serious Play, a career-spanning exhibition of nearly two hundred works drawn from Fundaci\u00f3n Mapfre\u2019s extensive collection. The show offers a rare opportunity to experience the full breadth of her vision \u2013 from early portraits to later meditations on landscape \u2013 most rendered in black and white, the visual language she has embraced since her formative years studying with Manuel \u00c1lvarez Bravo.<\/p>\n\u201cColor feels unreal to me,\u201d Iturbide said. \u201cI work in black and white, I dream in black and white, I photograph in black and white because it is an abstraction of everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Far from monotonous, her monochrome images pulse with depth and soul, the result of an intimate and immersive approach. To document Indigenous communities, Iturbide has lived among her subjects, participated in their daily routines and rituals, and built trust over months and sometimes years, as she did while creating her lauded book of photographs Juchit\u00e1n de las Mujeres (1979\u201386), to which she dedicated nearly a decade.<\/p>\n
Mujer \u00e1ngel, desierto de Sonora, M\u00e9xico, 1979. Photograph: Fernando Maquieira\/Fundaci\u00f3n Mapfre<\/p>\n
In 1978, a commission from Mexico\u2019s National Indigenous Institute took Iturbide to the Sonoran Desert, where she photographed the Seri people, nomadic fishermen striving to preserve their ancestral traditions. From this project emerged Mujer \u00c1ngel, Desierto de Sonora, M\u00e9xico (1979), a photograph, on show at the ICP, which the artist describes as a gift from the desert itself, as she can\u2019t recall the exact moment she captured it, a testament to the profound and intuitive relationship she maintains with the places and people she photographs.<\/p>\n
While various elements of Indigenous Mexican communities, their rituals and festivals, flora and fauna, and sweeping landscapes, feature prominently in Iturbide\u2019s oeuvre, portraits of women, such as Vendedora de z\u00e1cate, Oaxaca, M\u00e9xico (1974), have remained a central and resonant focus throughout her practice.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo you know why my photos of women have traveled the world? Because I\u2019ve lived with them, gone to the market, sold jitomates with them, and slept in their houses. They become my collaborators. It\u2019s my way of creating camaraderie, a sense of complicity,\u201d she explains. \u201cI always photograph with the consent and collaboration of the people.\u201d<\/p>\n
M\u00e9xico, 1969. Photograph: Fundaci\u00f3n Mapfre<\/p>\n
The iconic portrait of the woman crowned with iguanas also emerged from this approach. \u201cI would sit with the women at the market so they could get to know me, and I would accompany them to sell their chickens and iguanas,\u201d Iturbide recalled. \u201cAll of a sudden, I saw this woman carrying live iguanas on her head and asked to photograph her. I only had one roll of film, and of the 12 frames I took, all were in motion and she was laughing, except one, which captured her dignity. Now there is a large sculpture of her in a plaza in Juchit\u00e1n, where countless political demonstrations take place. They\u2019ve made small clay figurines of her, embroidered her image on huipiles, and she even appears in murals in Los Angeles and San Francisco. This photo didn\u2019t ask for my permission; she wants to soar, and that\u2019s fine, it\u2019s fine that she goes wherever she wants.\u201d<\/p>\n
While spontaneity plays a central role in Iturbide\u2019s practice, her work is also rooted in careful preparation and respect for the people and cultures she photographs. \u201cI never work with scripts. I only capture what emerges by surprise, that is, what my eyes see and my heart feels, but I always read extensively about the places I\u2019m visiting and I speak with the elders so they can share their stories and gradually help me form my understanding of their culture,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n
This balance between intuition and intention extends into her studio, where developing film unfolds as a quiet ritual. \u201cAfter photographing, I return home. I still work with film: I develop it, review the contact sheets, and organize them. For me, it is a ritual, arriving, examining my negatives, and selecting them,\u201d she said. This deliberate process mirrors the contemplative nature of her images, revealing the reverence at the core of her practice.<\/p>\n
Autorretrato con los indios seris, desierto de Sonora, M\u00e9xico, 1979 Photograph: Fundaci\u00f3n Mapfre<\/p>\n
Iturbide\u2019s self-portraits, several of which will be on view at the ICP, also arise from her instinctive impulse. \u201cI never prepare my self-portraits; it\u2019s something that happens in the moment, usually when I\u2019m in a bit of a crisis,\u201d she explained. \u201cFor instance, in Eyes to Fly With?, Coyoac\u00e1n, Mexico (1991), a hummingbird had come into my house and died. I was in a crisis, wondering if I would continue photographing, so I quickly went to the market, bought a live one, and placed both on my eyes, all in a very unconscious way.\u201d<\/p>\n
In recent years, as security concerns have made photographing in Mexico\u2019s rural towns increasingly difficult, Iturbide\u2019s focus has further shifted beyond Indigenous communities to include landscapes, nature and broader reflections on humanity across different countries. \u201cIn some ways, I think I\u2019m now turning my attention to the origin of humankind,\u201d she said. Still, her practice remains as spontaneous and heart-centered as ever. \u201cI may be wrong, but I don\u2019t have rules,\u201d she said. \u201cWorking with my heart is the only rule \u2013 nothing else.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you\u2019re at all familiar with contemporary Latin American photography, you\u2019ve probably encountered the unforgettable image of a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":223498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[449,458,459,64,63,460,134],"class_list":{"0":"post-223497","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-design","14":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}