Luis Gonzalez Palma: Poems of Sorrow - Hardcover

John Wood

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1892041057 ISBN 13: 9781892041050

Publisher: Arena Editions, 1999

Synopsis

Luis Gonzalez Palma's photographs are marked by a rich texture of transcendent symbols and an open-armed embrace of beauty. Crowns, roses, and wings appear again and again, yet his world is one haunted by grief. He has said, "I live in a country where there is mysticism and violence at the same time-where you are enjoying nature and the helicopters are flying overhead to bomb some region; where you know that as you are working, someone is being killed or someone is being baptized." However, Gonzalez Palma is no documentary photographer. His landscape is not that of Guatemala but that of the soul, and it is filled with angels and terrifying, mythic beasts. The shadows that pervade it stem less from politics than from the sorrow of the human condition. For all the pain in his work, though, he never takes us to those Gates of Hell, where we must abandon all hope. His subject is grief--never despair.

About this title

About the Author:

Luis Gonzalez Palma was born in 1957. The Art Institute of Chicago, the Berlin Museum, the Maison Europeenne de la Photographie (Paris), and the Los Angeles County Museum, among many others, have acquired his work.

John Wood is the author of several prize-winning books of poetry and photographic criticism, essays on a wide variety of subjects in both books and journals, and editor of 21st: The Journal of Contemporary Photography.

From Library Journal:

Ironic combinations of archetypal symbols define the work of photographer Luis Gonz lez Palma. Born and raised in war-torn Guatemala, Gonz lez Palma portrays history, conflict, grief, and ultimately hope in his work. He began creating his timeless, layered portraits, assemblages, and installations in the mid-1980s and has since exhibited them worldwide. Trained as an architect, he is now a builder of images. His portraits of Mayan Indians, which might be more accurately described as constructions, make up the bulk of his work. At the center of these pieces is a headshot, direct in gaze, the subject fantastically adorned with a culturally significant or metaphorical headdress. The photograph is incorporated into a larger composition including objects such as ribbons, old wallpaper, texts, and iconic photographs. These elements culminate in a textural and aesthetic whole. Like poems, Gonz lez Palma's images unfold with increasing significance, resulting in an underlying sense of tension and forboding that is only slightly eased by their sheer loveliness. This first comprehensive survey of his work includes roughly 150 full-page color plates. Recommended for libraries with contemporary photography collections.ADebora Miller, Minneapolis
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Arena Editions
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 1892041057
• ISBN 13: 9781892041050
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 151