"Exils" The environmental disaster of the Black Triangle in Koudelka's photographs by Maurizio Berlincioni A splendid exhibition was underway at the Alinari Museum, dedicated to Josef Koudelka, one of the most important protagonists and representatives of contemporary world photography. Exhibited are segments of his most significant work, from pictures of spring in Prague to panoramic photos, especially those of the environmental devastation of the Black Triangle, the industrial zone of the metalliferous mountains on the border bevween Bohemia, Germany and Poland. One of the most extraordinary and sensitive members of the Magnum agency, a tireless traveller, perceptive and methodical observer of the complexities of life, Koudelka is a man rather different from the stereotype that we are given by hasty journalists eager for a scoop who tend to present him as "a Czech exile on the way to becoming a legend" and speak always of rucksacks and sleeping bags, mountain boots and small format equipment, nourishing thus a partial and belittling myth. France Odd and fascinating, in an uncertain Italian, closer to French and Spanish ( I don't really believe Koudelka has ever taken the trouble to get properly to grips with any of the many languages he knows) he responds in presenting his work the day of the press conference with irritation to anyone who asks him a little naively if "he takes photos for himself or to show to others what interests him". He rejects adamantly the etiquette of the man who searches out at any cost pain and tragedy even though at the heart of all his pictures one powerfully discerns the presence of death and detaghment, A solitary traveller, he became the man attracted to precarious places, uncertain destinations and silence. Departures and arrivals seemingly without reason, prolonged stays "wherever fate takes him" and then a frenetic activity of shooting, accumulations of pictures that for a long time are not even developed, as if he was frightened of reaching the day when it would no longer be possible for him to take photographs; one perceives in his work a constant sense of urgency in his compulsion to record. In his images, often surreal, time, place and space are as if suspended and unrecognisable, the people he loves and photographs continually repeat ancestral gestures, gestures that arrive from afar, gestures that are reduced to their essence. Despite the fascination that death and pain exert over him, Koudelka is not a sad person; on the contrary he is a man capable of great enthusiasm and explosions of uncontrollable joy. Ireland In his sought after solitude he looks out at the world with active melancholy and little does it matter whether it's in Italy or Portugal, Spain or Ireland where he's taking his pictures: Koudelka follows anyway his invisible thread that enables him to be present and a witness at the scene of the universal theatre of the human lot, moving about with delicacy and respect in a world regulated by constant violence towards the weak whether they be men, women, animals or environments, in some way classless, exiled from the habitual context and considered therefore "different". "Exils" - Florence, Fratelli Alinari Museum of History of photography Palazzo Rucellai, Via della Vigna Nuova 16r Catalogue Lit.90.000 Photojournalist On Line Photojournalism and Photography E-mail:fotoreporter@catpress.com Via Faentina 127 - 50133 Florence, Italy ph. +39 55 575488 - fax +39 55 587321 © Photojournalist - All rights reserved