France recognizes the work of Graciela Iturbide

I speak little French, but I understand France more.said photographer Graciela Iturbide Parodying Alfonso Reyesbeing awarded the Order of Arts and Letters in the official rank of the French Republic, an act carried out by the French ambassador Delphine Borione.

Before a large group of friends, colleagues, family members and cultural promoters gathered at Francia’s residence, Iturbide explained that “the country has accompanied me in many ways throughout my life and photography career. I have lived in France, not only in my repeated stays in Paris and other cities in the province, but also from a distance, in this Mexico that looks at it and draws on its culture for so many years.

I have read its poets and thinkers; I have visited its museums to discover its ancient and contemporary painters; I have admired the images of its great photographers, among whom Brassai has inspired me and Henri Cartier-Bresson has distinguished me with his friendship. I have absorbed France through its cuisine and I have wandered through the streets of Paris as if they were drawing my own geography.

France, for the photographer, is a way of being, a style of conceiving art and life, a sting and a boldness in artistic creation. My recent retrospective exhibition (2022) at the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art has been a milestone in my artistic journey, a kind of giftas well as this decoration is a new one of This country that I have loved since my age of reason.

For Borione, the distinction celebrates the talent of an artist respected and admired by the French and international public, but also by A free and brave woman, who raised her two children, Mauricio and Manuel, while pursuing higher education in the field of the arts..

In his career spanning more than 50 years, he established several favourite themes and a style of his own, often in black and white. However, Your lens has captured images of an art that is always committed, without becoming politicized. Your photography allows us to travel and reflect on different themes and very current issues: life and death, the environment and the relationship between humans and animals, alternative models of society to patriarchy, sexuality, violence, migration and the refugee crisis..

According to the diplomat, Iturbide’s photograph contributes to celebrating values ​​appreciated both in France and in Mexico. The decorated woman also has a very personal way of paying a powerful tribute to women, immortalizing their faces in his film in a poetic and human way. These are images that also highlight the strength and dignity of the indigenous peoples he has visited around the world, without forgetting those of his own country, They have never been portrayed in such a real and poetic way at the same time..

Borione highlighted that Iturbide’s work has been exhibited for more than 40 years in emblematic cultural venues, from the Pompidou Centre in 1982 to the International Photography Meetings in Arles in 1991 and 2011. Iturbide represents the best of Franco-Mexican cooperation and our shared values: freedom, generosity, the defense of women’s rights, conservation and respect for nature, as well as the promotion of indigenous cultures.

The ambassador concluded: “You often say that you seek ‘surprise in the ordinary’; however, you have taken your art to an extraordinary level and today France recognises you for that.”