He was born Pierre Verger in Paris, France in 1902 and died Pierre Fatumbi Verger in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. He was 93 years old. By him, a photographer, ethnologist, anthropologist and researcher, he is said to have lived two lives. In the midst of two different universes, between modern and exotic, between reason and mysticism. Thus, at the age of 30, after the death of his mother, he began his journey around the world, ready to capture life behind a camera that would broaden his accentuated view of other cultures. At 51 he reappeared under the name of Fatumbi (born again), ordained Babalao (priest), father of mysteries in the voodoo cult, in Dahomey, now Benin. Later, based in Brazil, one of his activities was to document the connections between Brazilian black culture and Africa as an unexpected consequence of the African diaspora caused by the slavery to which the black population was subjected.
‘500, Fifth Avenue, Manhattan, New York’ Pierre Fatumbi Verger
’15, Doyers Street. Bowery, Manhattan, New York, Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“Harlem, New York” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“Colonial Park Pool, Harlem, New York” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“Coney Island Beach, Brooklyn, New York” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“St. Joseph Catholic Church, C St. NE, Washington DC” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“French Market, New Orleans” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
‘San Carlos, Arizona’ Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“Empire State Building, Manhattan, New York” Pierre Fatumbi Verger
Cover of the book “Pierre Fatumbi Verger. United States of America, 1934 & 1937′, Javier Escudero Rodríguez.
Verger left thirty books and some 62,000 negatives made over a period of four decades, from 1930 to 1970; a photo archive that has survived his life as a nomad. Although in 1991, four years before his death, the retrospective dedicated to him at the Museum of African and Oceanic Art in Paris rediscovered his work in Europe and placed his name among the great photographers of the 20th century in the United States. The number is practically unknown, despite the invaluable documentation of this country made by the author in the thirties. Hence the piercing look that Pierre Fatumbi Verger throws at us. United States of America. 1934 & 1937, a recent monograph by Damiani, serves not only to establish prestige but also to confirm the author’s personality and the depth of his work. “Her portraits and images remain indispensable to this day in her depiction of beauty, work, spirituality, play and cultural memory,” writes Deborah Willis. “These are not just photographs: they offer a complex portrait of politics, race and identity.”
The cover of the book features a photo of a Negro. The boy walks and looks to the side. Attentive to what is happening, front and back. It’s not Harlem, it’s Manhattan. In front of it is the Park Avenue Viaduct. Beside him the blurred figures of some white passers-by. “All day I photographed the chaos: buildings, taxis, young girls, black people, mayors, homeless people, senators, fancy dogs. In the afternoon I develop and copy and the next day I shoot again,” Verger wrote. His first trip to New York took place in the winter of 1934. He arrived accompanied by two journalists, which was one of his first assignments as a photojournalist for the French newspaper Paris-Soir. From there he will follow the route to Japan and China, but before that he has toured the streets of Manhattan, the clubs of Harlem, Washington DC, Charleston in South Carolina, Florida and New Orleans. In California he visited the Mexican market, from San Francisco he went to Japan. The second visit to New York took place in 1937. He returned to Manhattan, passed through Harlem and visited Coney Island before sailing to Paris.
“Harlem, NY”. Pierre Fatumbi Verger
He wore the Rolleiflex. He had not yet confirmed his style as a photographer, but his technical mastery, his precision and at the same time his heterodoxy were already making themselves felt. A look full of empathy and soul in search of the raw expression of the subject. He spent a lot of time paying close attention to details, people’s walk, their clothes, the expressions of their bodies and the angles of their intimacy. “What struck me about his work was the quality, the sensibility it expressed, and the subject matter it represented,” says the publication’s promoter, Javier Escudero Rodríguez, during a video conference call from Brazil. After years of research, he was responsible for processing the 150 images that make up the book from more than 1,110 negatives. “Not only did Verger know how to look, she also knew how to smile and say thank you when taking pictures,” he says. “Most of the images are unpublished, and while they show some urban and rural landscapes, their distinctiveness lies in the human landscape, in a broader and more diverse vision of the United States of those years, which was made up of people from diverse backgrounds: black, Asian, and fisherman, Italian. It opens a new door to representation for the non-white people of that time. People who, oddly enough, don’t usually appear in the images of Depression America.
The work sets a clear precedent for the social photography boom that led to the formation of the famed Farm Security Administration (Administration for Agrarian Security), created by Roy E. Stryker. The photographer and economist hired a number of photographers, including Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and Margaret Bourke-White, to document how New Deal policies were transforming American society mired in a terrible economic crisis. “When selecting photographs, Stryker used to dominate the image of white people. There was clearly an exclusion,” warns Escudero. However, there is no political consciousness in Verger’s work, no intention to improve society. He never joined any political movement, nor was he a photographic one. Most of the images were taken in the context of everyday life without claiming to denounce. “Moreover, they are clearly distinguished by their purpose of portraying the photographed subject as an admirable, perhaps even desirable, person,” warns Alex Baradel, head of the Pierre Verger Foundation’s photo archive, in one of the texts in the book. “These images were taken for their own intrinsic value. Their lack of any artistic, dogmatic or commercial intent makes them all the more powerful.”
“Colonial Park Pool, Harlem, New York”. Pierre Fatumbi Verger
“Verger reimagined the visual narrative of black life at the time,” notes Willis. He toured Harlem in the winter and summer, where we see couples dancing in the halls, women conversing peacefully in front of the church, and children walking their dogs. In Charleston, he captures the image of a woman leaning against a colonial building with an infinitely sad and frightened look on her face. In New Orleans, a man carries a sack in search of a future where there is none, in clear reference to slavery. Verger’s photographs “have the ability to evoke a complex history,” notes Willis, “while creating a vision of an uplifting and compassionate community.”
Pierre Fatumbi Verger. United States of America. 1934 & 1937′. Javier Escudero Rodriguez. Damiani. 160 pages. 55 euros.
Follow BABELIA on Facebook and Twitteror sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter.
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits