Fotomuseum Winterthur | Saturday, 14.06. – Sunday, 17.08.1997

World Views – Reportage Photography and its Media

For a number of years, now, critical voices have been declaring the death of reportage photography. And perhaps with some justice, as reporting photography has lost many of its tasks to the electronic medium; it is struggling in an ever more complex, in an ever more imponderable world, for the meaning of the visible; and one of its most important qualities, that of bearing witness, has been called into question by digitalization. This declaration of death is, however, unjustified, as all of us can see no end to our elementary need for reports on the important things and events in the world.

This paradox and the many other questions directed at the status of reportage and documentary photography in our media-informed reality will be delved into in this exhibition – through means of works taken by Swiss photographers abroad in Iran, in India, Tibet, Ruanda, Patagonia, Madagascar, in Algeria, the Western Sahara, and at home in our trusted environs – Swiss piety, the kids, working and nightlife.

The exhibition was curated by Martin Gasser and Urs Stahel.

Main sponsor: Bundesamt für Kultur