During the past decade Luis González Palma (Guatemala, b. 1957) shot to fame as the most important photographer in Latin America. Around 1985 the Guatemalan, who had graduated as an architect and filmmaker, made his first photographs of dancers and actors with a borrowed camera. The theatrical aspects of these staged portraits were the basis for his later autonomous work.

González Palma stretched the traditional boundaries of the medium by incorporating his painted and scratched photographs in small installations. Using this new visual language he investigated the tragic heritage of colonialism and the subjugation of the native cultures of Guatemala. His serene, engaged and politically charged art photography grew in power from the time that he began to work in larger formats. A first, extensive solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art in New York in 1989 was ultimately the beginning of an impressive list of exhibitions in North America and Europe. The photographer himself remains modest despite his success and leading role in Latin American photography. 'I'm not doing anything new. I recreate what I have seen, what moved, touched or aroused me.' At the same time, with this statement he makes clear that the power of his work lies in its close linkage with his own culture.

Courtesy Marta Schnider Gallery (USA)