Salgado’s images of a gold mine in the Amazon were instantly famous. The mine had been photographed before, so why were his images special? His then editor thinks the absence of colour helped to highlight an “ideal” version of the male body. Mostly, though, he ascribes it to Salgado’s patience in seeking out images that spoke to his chosen narrative- “the idea of labour, its dignity and its degradation.”
Sekgala, working after apartheid had been abolished, was interested in its lingering impact on “identity”. Most acclaimed are his images of young people who, like himself, had been displaced by the homelands policy. “Fences, roadsides and derelict buildings are recurrent motifs … [people] searching for a sense of belonging and protection in a torn landscape, establishing a sense of hope for a future not yet built.”
The African American Gordon Parks was famous for his documentary photography. Roy DeCarava was different, adopting an artistic approach. His spontaneous images of 1950’s Harlem are distinguished by a “painterly aesthetic” and a sympathetic eye for his subjects, “[casting] loose the norms of preparation, clarity, and stark black-and-white contrasts”. Images are here.