Martin Chambi
(Peruvian photographer, 1891-1973)
Peruvian, (1891–1973)
Peruvian photographer, and the first indigenous photographer in the Americas to attract international attention. Born into a poor, rural Quechua?speaking community, he was an unlikely candidate to do so. Aged 14, apparently due to a chance encounter with a British photographer assisting the Santo Domingo Mining Company, he became obsessed with the medium. Within two years, after panning for gold grains to pay his bus fare, he became apprenticed to the studio of Max T. Vargas in the southern city of Arequipa.
It took another dozen years for him to establish his own studio at Sicuani, and to visit Machu Picchu for the first time, accompanying an archaeological excavation. Fascinated by the ancient, and largely unacknowledged, culture of the indigenous peoples of Peru, he embarked on a lifelong project to document the architecture, markets, celebrations, ceremonies, communities, and individuals of the Andes. Concurrently, from 1920, he operated a successful portrait studio in the former Inca capital, Cuzco. It also functioned as a gallery: on one side of the door hung his majestic landscapes of snow?capped mountains and volcanic lakes and, on the other, portraits of local people in their vivid hand?woven clothes and blankets in a rich variety of regional styles.
The 1920s saw the rise of the indigenista movement in universities and cultural centres. Chambi was held up as a prime example of a revindication of venerable traditions overrun since the Hispanic invasion. He became active in the movement, publishing and exhibiting in its cause. He maintained his voluminous photographic output until the devastating earthquake of 1950. After that, he laid aside the plate camera that gave his work its characteristic format and formality, and shot only intermittently and on film. The destruction of his beloved Cuzco was, he believed, the end of his inspiration.
Read more: Martin Chambi Biography - (1891–1973), indigenista, Cuzco, capital arqueológico de Suramérica, Martin Chambi http://arts.jrank.org/pages/10268/Martin-Chambi.html#ixzz1Eho1ZaAK
Chambi learned photography in 1900 and from 1908 to 1917 and was an apprentice to the photographer Max T. Vargas in Arequipa, Peru. In 1917, he opened his own studio in Sicuani, Peru and in 1920, he moved to Cuzco, where he practiced commercial portrait photography and also recorded the "heritage of the Indian culture in the highland", in an effort to preserve it. In the years between 1920 and 1939, Chambi documented the city of Cuzco and the regional architecture of Peru. In 1924-1925, Chambi set up a second studio in Cuzco which operated until 1973. He was the co-founder of the Instituto Americano de Arte, Cuzco, in 1927-1928. - ULAN
(Peruvian photographer, 1891-1973)
Peruvian, (1891–1973)
Peruvian photographer, and the first indigenous photographer in the Americas to attract international attention. Born into a poor, rural Quechua?speaking community, he was an unlikely candidate to do so. Aged 14, apparently due to a chance encounter with a British photographer assisting the Santo Domingo Mining Company, he became obsessed with the medium. Within two years, after panning for gold grains to pay his bus fare, he became apprenticed to the studio of Max T. Vargas in the southern city of Arequipa.
It took another dozen years for him to establish his own studio at Sicuani, and to visit Machu Picchu for the first time, accompanying an archaeological excavation. Fascinated by the ancient, and largely unacknowledged, culture of the indigenous peoples of Peru, he embarked on a lifelong project to document the architecture, markets, celebrations, ceremonies, communities, and individuals of the Andes. Concurrently, from 1920, he operated a successful portrait studio in the former Inca capital, Cuzco. It also functioned as a gallery: on one side of the door hung his majestic landscapes of snow?capped mountains and volcanic lakes and, on the other, portraits of local people in their vivid hand?woven clothes and blankets in a rich variety of regional styles.
The 1920s saw the rise of the indigenista movement in universities and cultural centres. Chambi was held up as a prime example of a revindication of venerable traditions overrun since the Hispanic invasion. He became active in the movement, publishing and exhibiting in its cause. He maintained his voluminous photographic output until the devastating earthquake of 1950. After that, he laid aside the plate camera that gave his work its characteristic format and formality, and shot only intermittently and on film. The destruction of his beloved Cuzco was, he believed, the end of his inspiration.
Read more: Martin Chambi Biography - (1891–1973), indigenista, Cuzco, capital arqueológico de Suramérica, Martin Chambi http://arts.jrank.org/pages/10268/Martin-Chambi.html#ixzz1Eho1ZaAK
Chambi learned photography in 1900 and from 1908 to 1917 and was an apprentice to the photographer Max T. Vargas in Arequipa, Peru. In 1917, he opened his own studio in Sicuani, Peru and in 1920, he moved to Cuzco, where he practiced commercial portrait photography and also recorded the "heritage of the Indian culture in the highland", in an effort to preserve it. In the years between 1920 and 1939, Chambi documented the city of Cuzco and the regional architecture of Peru. In 1924-1925, Chambi set up a second studio in Cuzco which operated until 1973. He was the co-founder of the Instituto Americano de Arte, Cuzco, in 1927-1928. - ULAN
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