California Grape Strike. Ceasar Chavez. 1966.Copyright Paul Fusco/Magnum Photos
I was fortunate to be asked to contribute to the Magnum Foundation's new book titled Paul Fusco: Political America ( still in production at this time.) A visual compendium of the major social and political movements since the 1960's, the book brought me back to historic moments in my life that were forgotten in the ever- increasing wash of images of new movements and events, as well as memories of being a young researcher in the Magnum Archives circa 1985. I don't particularly recall many of Paul's images in those amazingly rich files: he was based in California and his work seemed under the radar. Yet Fusco's book flows with page after page of quietly powerful photographs documenting the arc of American's struggle to defend their basic civil rights and dignity: the Berkeley Free Speech Movement, Cesar Chavez, AIDS, homelessness, welfare, RFK's funeral train, several police brutality demonstrations, and a devastating extended story on the funerals of US soldiers killed in the Iraq Wars. Indeed it seems as if Fusco was out there, quietly yet fiercely visually advocating where ever Americans were suffering, mistreated or defending their civil rights during my own adult life. I look forward to completing the project. Meanwhile check out Paul Fusco's work on Magnum's web site. Reintroduce yourself to an understated master.
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