A Salute to the Masters: Gypsies in Como (A Tribute to Josef Koudelka)

This article is dedicated to the Czech photographer, Josef Koudelka, and his book, “Gypsies,” a classic in documentary photography. “Gypsies” contains a series of images Koudelka took between 1962 and 1971 in the former Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary, France, and Spain. Here, he was able to masterfully depict the simplicity of the gypsy lifestyle, never presenting their situation as a social problem but instead showing their lives as a mix of joyfulness and wonder, sorrow and mystery.

Arguably one of the greatest Magnum photographers, Josef Koudelka is considered one of the most important black and white street and social photographer of the 20th and 21st centuries. Born in 1938 in the Czech Republic, Koudelka studied at the Czech Technical University in Prague. He obtained a degree in 1961 and began his career as an aeronautical engineer. At the same time, he began to photograph gypsies in Czechoslovakia and the theaters in Prague. He took commissions from theater magazines.

However, in 1967, Koudelka decided to abandon his work as an engineer to become a full-time photographer. He returned to his project about gypsies. In 1968, he made a reportage about the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. Miraculously, his negatives were smuggled out of his country and published anonymously on The Sunday Times Magazine under the initials P. P. (Prague Photographer) for fear of reprisal. Koudelka left Czechoslovakia for political asylum in 1970. In 1971, he joined Magnum Photos.

In 1975, Koudelka published his first book, Gypsies. In 1988, he published arguably one of the most beautiful photography books ever, Exiles. He won important awards like the Nadar Prix (1978), the Grand Prix National de la Photographie (1989), the Grand Prix Cartier-Bresson (1991), and the Hasselblad Foundation International Award in Photography (1992).

Today, Koudelka resides in France and in Prague and is continuing his work documenting the European landscape using a panoramic camera.

To realize his reportage on gypsies, Koudelka traveled with them all over Europe, from Romania to Spain. He was quoted as saying:

From 1961 to 1966, I took pictures of gypsies because I loved the music and culture. They were like me in many ways. Now, there are less and less of these people so I can’t really say anything else about them. (source)

In this tribute, I selected two sets of my own photos. The first one depicts begging, which nomads on the Italian territory commonly do. As a show of respect for these people who, historically, had been victims of prejudices and serious persecution, I have not photographed their faces.

Meanwhile, the second set shows photos of brilliant gypsy artists that delight passersby in the old town of my city, Como, with their traditional music. Their performances are important moments that demonstrate their knowledge of their old musical traditions, which I show here as a nice cultural fact.

A Salute to the Masters is a series dedicated to great photographers that I like. I posted other tributes for Walker Evans, Lee Friedlander, Helen Levitt, Ernst Haas, Stephen Shore, Gabriele Basilico, Robert Adams, Thomas Struth, J.H. Lartigue, Elliott Erwitt, Robert Frank, Gianni Berengo Gardin, André Kertész, Willy Ronis, Brassaï, Rodchenko, Dan Graham, Henry Grant, William Eggleston, Dennis Stock, Juergen Teller, Martin Parr, Peter Mitchell, Mario Giacomelli, David Burnett, Michael Williamson, Bernard Cahier, Harry Gruyaert, Bruno Barbey, Paul Strand, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Lothar Rübelt, David Goldblatt, Henry Cartier-Bresson, Raymond Depardon, Aaron Siskind, Mario de Biasi, Sabine Weiss, Jack Delano, Bill Eppridge, Édouard Boubat, Serge Moulinier, George Krause, Robert Doisneau, Ferdinando Scianna, Robert Capa, Alexey Brodovitch, Yann Arthus-Bertrand, Christopher Williams, Pepi Merisio and Izis Bidermanas. I especially love street photography and urban architectural photography.

Scritto da sirio174 il 2015-10-31 in #lifestyle #gypsies #regular-contributor #a-salute-to-the-masters #josef-koudelka