Photo­graph­ies by Martin Parr

Martin Parr, 1997-2018
Currently visible at exhibition "Soleil·s"

© Agence Muto

Martin Parr is a chron­icler of our age. In the face of the constantly grow­ing flood of images released by the media, his photo­graphs offer us the oppor­tun­ity to see the world from his unique perspect­ive.

At first glance, his photo­graphs seem exag­ger­ated or even grot­esque. The motifs he chooses are strange, the colours are garish and the perspect­ives are unusual. Parr’s term for the over­whelm­ing power of published images is “propa­ganda”. He coun­ters this propa­ganda with his own chosen weapons: criti­cism, seduc­tion and humour. As a result, his photo­graphs are original and enter­tain­ing, access­ible and under­stand­able. But at the same time they show us in a penet­rat­ing way that we live, how we present ourselves to others, and what we value.

Leis­ure, consump­tion and commu­nic­a­tion are the concepts that this Brit­ish photo­grapher has been research­ing for several decades now on his world­wide travels. In the process, he exam­ines national char­ac­ter­ist­ics and inter­na­tional phenom­ena to find out how valid they are as symbols that will help future gener­a­tions to under­stand our cultural pecu­li­ar­it­ies. Parr enables us to see things that have seemed famil­iar to us in a completely new way. In this way he creates his own image of soci­ety, which allows us to combine an analysis of the visible signs of glob­al­isa­tion with unusual visual exper­i­ences. In his photos, Parr juxta­poses specific images with univer­sal ones without resolv­ing the contra­dic­tions. Indi­vidual char­ac­ter­ist­ics are accep­ted and eccent­ri­cit­ies are treas­ured.

The themes Parr selects and his inim­it­able treat­ment of them set him apart as a photo­grapher whose work involves the creation of extens­ive series. Part of his unusual strategy is to present and publish the same photos in the context of art photo­graphy, in exhib­i­tions and in art books, as well as in the related fields of advert­ising and journ­al­ism. In this way, he tran­scends the tradi­tional separ­a­tion of the differ­ent types of photo­graphy. Thanks to this integ­rat­ive approach, as well as his style and his choice of themes, he has long served as a model for the younger gener­a­tion of photo­graph­ers.

Martin Parr sens­it­ises our subcon­scious – and once we’ve seen his photo­graphs, we keep on discov­er­ing these images over and over again in our daily lives and recog­nising ourselves within them. The humour in these photo­graphs makes us laugh at ourselves, with a sense of recog­ni­tion and release.

– Thomas Weski

 

Cred­its
Benidorm, Spain, 1997
Benidorm, Spain, 1997
Benidorm, Spain, 1997
Dakar, Senegal, 2001
Cuba, 2001
Gucci Cruse, Cannes, France, 2018

© Martin Parr / Magnum Photos

Produced by