So I know that the Getty Center in Los Angeles is not oon the list of place we are supposed to attend during this course, but it just happened that I found myself there a nd walked through a fascinating photo exhibit. The exhibit was called "The Goat Dance: the photographs of Graciela Iturbide".
The artist's media of choice was black and white photography. The prints were called silver gelatin, I think. There were quite a few pieces there that made a lasting impression on me. The first one that struck me was a photograph of what seemed to be a million birds exploding off of a telephone wire, in the middle of a bleak empty sky, in the middle of a bleak empty town. While looking a the photo, I couldn't help but think about the moment that it was taken. What the sound must have been to here all those hundreds of birds leap off the wire. Did the sky grow darker from all their shadows? What made them jump in the first place? What made them all gather there in the first place? Where could this be? Is this what the photographer intended to take a photo of? Or was she actually looking for something else entirely when it happened? Was entirely staged? I guess it would kind of have to be, in order to have the shutter speed just right.
The series of her photography I found the most interesting was about the cholas and cholos that belonged to a gang in East LA. They are candid shots of the gang members in their local stomping grounds. Shots of the women mostly. With their “family” and their children. They stare into the camera proud of what they are and what the represent. Brandishing their gang signs by contorting their fingers in such a way towards the camera. And through their pride and gang uniforms nd their hardness and caluosnesss behind it all you could see somewhere in there eyes a mourning. A mourning aloss of something. Mourning a loss of their identities. Though they are proud of what they represent for reasons I am not sure all of them were sure of, they did not know who they were. I don’t think they even knew who they were supposed to be. All they are sure of is that they are need be tougher, stronger, meaner, and better than the other gangs.
I don’t want to over labor that topic, but their was something I learned by soaking in this work. This is the kind of photos and truth and clarity that I want my photos to have. I want to be able to show the true condition of the drinkers and those around them. I want to show them in how they seem so proud of their state and at the same time I want viewers to be detect the things under the surface in the people and the characters are experiencing. Or I guess not experiencing in a sense… The things they are masking with the achohol. The feelings they are numbing while being drunk. I want people to ask questions when they look at the photos. I want people to ask something about the people they see in the photos. I want them to be able to detach from themselves in the other person’s story, and ask themselves questions they might be afraid to ask themselves about themselves. By the time they have gone through that process, they can find themselves seeing the similarities between themselves and the character. And in that moment they won’t have to lie to themselves. They will feel safe in being truthful with themselves for maybe a moment, and maybe in that moment it can change their lives.
That’s what the photographic exhibit of Graciela Iturbide made me think of. It was a fulfilling and inspiring lesson that gave me more drive and motivation to shoot photographs. It brought into focus what I have been looking for.
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