Repeat, repeat, repeat

Palermo

Evita

The documentary about Evita made me understand a lot more about the related things we saw in the city. I did not really know much about Evita prior to going to Buenos Aires, and the film really helped me to understand the Argentine love for her. 

I felt that the documentary gave mixed messages about Evita. It talked about all the things that she tried to accomplished for the people but in a very negative way. It seem to be skeptical of what Evita was doing. I guess because I am an outsider I cant really understand, however how can building a safe and secure place for children to play and learn make you a bad person? This brings up the argument that is a good deed any less nobel if you are doing it for publicity? Is a charitable work only worth something if you do it in completely out public eye?

In my opinion Evita did a lot of great things that did benefit the people of Argentina. Wether her intentions were pure or not are up for debate, however I personally do not thing that it devalued the works that she accomplished as her time in as first lady.

Leonel Luna

Leonel’s work was something very different then what I was used to. His images are very highly manipulated and constructed. This is something that I am torn about. I use photography as something to capture unseen, or looked over moments. Leonel uses it as means to build a situation, or recreate an historical image. He is falsifying an art form that is meant to tell the truth. By doing this he is making people question what they are looking at. The same person cannot physically be in the same photo seven times. The audience then is aware that this is a manipulated image and not something that really happened. This then opens many doors for people to question what is going on in the photography world. How is one to know if the image they are looking at is a truth or not? This then puts a spot light on all other photographers who take amazing and accurate photos, and they are left defending their work.

Although I do not agree with what Leonel is doing as an artist, I do have respect for his technical abilities. He has a pioneer in the digital era. Today people work with twenty mega pixel cameras and up. He said how when he started how he was working with mega pixels in the single digits. To create a perfectly stitched image as large as they were must have taken a great deal of time and effort.

Tina Modotti

I found Modotti’s work to have very great attention to details as well as a painterly quality to it. The way she framed and composed an image was very well thought out and maneuvered. Her photographs have a very personal and intimate feeling. Her still life were very reminiscent of Weston. It could be seen that she was greatly inspired by him. Her photographs almost created somewhat of an homage to him. 

The short film that was playing in the back of the the space was also very interesting. The Tiger’s Coat was a film of a girl who does what she needs to survive and make it in life. In all of that she falls in love and deceives the people that come to care about her. In the end however love wins out and all is well. I enjoyed the story, as well as the fact that you had to sit down and read it. This made you stop and we able to really appreciate the show more.

Martin Weber

I found Martin Weber’s talk extremely interesting. The way he talked about his work was very inspiring. He was so passionate about his message, and how he wanted to portray it. He took the concept of a dream and changed it into something more then just an idea. To the people that he photographed it was like he was giving them an outlet to express what their most inward desires were. He was giving them hope and a sense of a future. He gave them a place to look to rather just then allowing them to dwell on the situation that they were in. 

The next body of work that he showed us was from Echoes from the interior. I felt that these photographs had more of a personal feel. They way he spoke about these images  gave you the impression that these were images that he had emotional attachments to. After he explained an image, he would give a notion that related it to himself. You could tell that these were photographs of his country that he loved.

Del Norte

The week in Salta was very different then the previous week in Buenos Aires. Things in the north move a lot more slowly then that of the city. It was definitely an adjustment. The views were spectacular, and made you realize how not used to nature I am. I spend so much time in cities and urban areas that a simple mountain or desert landscape is something that blew me away. The people were also so much more friendly and willing to help you in the north. It had more of a homey feeling. Salta was very nice, however I think form the experience I realized that I defiantly like to live closer to a metropolitan area.