c. 2000 Religion News Service
WASHINGTON _ The photographs of Graciela Iturbide on display through Sept. 24 at the National Museum of Women in the Arts plunge the viewer into an array of images evocative of the deep spirituality of Latin America.
Titled “Images of the Spirit: Photographs of Graciela Iturbide,” the exhibit features more than 80 gelatin silver prints of this gifted woman’s ethnographic photography.
Iturbide, who lives today in Coyoacan, Mexico, dedicated years to studying the Zapotec Indian people in the town of Juchitan, Mexico. Her photographs stress the ceremonial and the simple in the lives of these people.
Unlike the compartmentalized personal religion sometimes typical of the United States, religiosity _ whether imported or indigenous _ bleeds into the canvas of day-to-day existence in Mexico. Like an onion, one culture often is layered upon another in this nation. So it sometimes seems with spirituality. Native folklore and ancient traditions weave into Christianity and other latter-day religions to create the tapestry that is Mexico.
Iturbide captures the surreal and the spiritual aspects of daily life. Beneath it all lurks her genuine compassion for her home country and its citizens.
“I retain in images casual external encounters and internal finalities,” she says. “I seek to trap life in the reality that surrounds me, remembering that my dreams, my symbols and my imagination are part of that life. In human beings I search to discover my own nostalgia.”
Like the paintings of the masters, her photographs seem to momentarily stop time, the lens of her camera uncovering an image that might be missed by a less imaginative eye.
Iturbide was born in Mexico City in 1942. After studying filmmaking in the late 1960s, she worked as a studio assistant to a well-known Mexican photographer and later traveled to Europe honing her eye and her artistic skill. In 1978, she became a founding member of the Mexican Council of Photography. She has received many honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1988.
Among her celebrated work is “Juchitan de las Mujeres” (The Women of Juchitan). The works on display in this exhibit at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, located at 1250 New York Ave. N.W., in Washington, are representative of some of her best work.
In “Nuestra Senora de las Iguanas” (Our Lady of the Iguanas), a writhing crown of iguanas adorns a woman’s head. Another work depicts an older woman in front of a wall with an abstract graffiti crucifix.
She portrays an amazing range. We see: “Mujer angel” (Angel woman), taken in the Sonora Desert, girl gangs in Los Angeles, even the world of children. In the latter, her pictures attract us and surprise us. One portrays a small child with angel wings. In another, a young girl dressed for first communion wears a skull mask.
The exhibit is in keeping with the goals of the National Museum of Women in the Arts. It strives to uncover the best contremporary art by women of various ethnic groups and nationalities and to call attention to the excellent work of women artists in past centuries.
With the Iturbide exhibit, the museum recognizes the significance of spirituality in the day-to-day lives of women and in the work of a gifted photographer.
KRE END HOLMES
