Revelaciones. Historia del fotolibro en Latinoamérica

The publication of photobooks in Latin America has been particularly intense. That said, they have largely gone undocumented. In response to this situation, a need was identified for research that would enable the excellent photobooks published in that part of the world over the last century to be catalogued and rediscovered for what they are—true works of art. Historian Horacio Fernández carried out four years of research in public and private libraries, second-hand stores, bibliographic databases, archives and collections on both sides of the Atlantic.

This ambitious project was made possible with the support of a team made up by the photographers Marcelo Brodsky, Iatã Cannabrava, Pablo Ortiz Monasterio and Martin Parr, as well as the publishers Ramón Reverté and Lesley Martin. The whole process—supported by the Agencia Española de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo (AECID) and the Centro Cultural de España en São Paulo—led to the publication, in 2011, of The Latin American Photobook, the volume around which this exhibition is based. Presented at Ivorypress last 3 November, the book was published in Spanish by Editorial RM, in English by Aperture Foundation and Fundación Televisa, in Portuguese by Cosac & Naify, and in French by Images En Manœuvres.

The exhibition, which remained on view until 14 July 2012, showcased scores of originals of seminal photobooks published in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru and Venezuela.

Images: © Iñaki Domingo NOPHOTO. Courtesy Ivorypress