shashasha

Theatrical spectacle within the disasters and incidents of everyday life – in his “Scene” series, award-winning Magnum photojournalist Alex Majoli takes a unique approach in capturing demonstrations, humanitarian emergencies and the quiet moments of everyday life around the world.
Within emerging situations, Majoli sets up artificial lights and his camera to give his photographs a sense of performance, artifice and dramatics. His unorthodox behavior as a photographer affects the subjects of his photographs; while Majoli offers neither direction nor rules, the people he photographs may still adjust their actions, their expressions. “Perhaps they refine their gestures in self-consciousness. Perhaps they do not. The representation of drama and the drama of representation become one. The camera flash is instantaneous and much stronger than daylight. But all this light plunges the world into night, or moonlight. The world appears as an illuminated stage.” (from the publisher’s statement)