"This is my country." Mariana Yampolsky knew it the moment she opened her window and saw a bougainvillea blooming against a white wall on her first morning in Mexico City in 1944. Her empathy for the Mexican people and their land has guided her work for more than fifty years, finding expression in books of dramatic black-and-white photographs ranging from her early La casa en la tierra and La casa que canta to The Traditional Architecture of Mexico. The Edge of Time presents a retrospective of Yampolsky's photographic work since 1960. Reflecting her lifelong concerns, the images capture rural Mexico and its people with respect and infinite care. They function as works of art and as documents of a moment in Mexico's history when lifeways that have endured for centuries face the onslaught of modernization. Elena Poniatowska has been Yampolsky's friend for many years and, in the foreword, she describes Yampolsky's method of working and includes many quotes from the photographer herself. Sandra Berler provides an overview of Yampolsky's life and the range of her work. Francisco Reyes Palma concludes the text with an exploration of Yampolsky's photographic aesthetic.

The Edge of Time: Photographs of Mexico by Mariana Yampolsky (Wittliff Gallery Series)

Arts & Photography

Yampolsky, Mariana

Individual Artists

University of Texas Press

All over the world there is a reawakening of interest in local, traditional approaches to architecture. In Mexico, nearly five centuries after the Spanish Conquest, the descendants of the Aztec and the Maya may no longer build pyramids, but their rural dwellings reflect the past in other ways: perfectly adapted to their environment, they incorporate natural materials such as palm for thatching, wattle, stones, adobe bricks and wood. They include an astonishing variety of forms - round, square, rectangular - with roofs that can be conical or pyramidal. In larger villages and mestizo towns, rooms are often grouped around an inner courtyard; eye-catching facades are painted in vibrant colors. A quite different kind of tradition is found in the rural haciendas, long past their Golden Age but now finding new patrons keen to restore or recreate them and their designs. In the 19th century especially, Gothic pointed arches, medieval battlements and Moorish minarets were transposed to Mexican landscapes of agave and prickly pear. Luxuriant gardens, tiles from England and statues from Paris completed the picture. Almost totally self-sufficient, haciendas were the economic backbone of rural Mexico from Conquest to Revolution. With the aid of plans and other historical illustrations, Chloe Sayer traces the story of traditional building and defines in detail the characteristics of architecture both private and public, rural and urban, Indian and colonial. Mariana Yampolsky's glorious photographs represent the summation of a lifetime's work. This is one of those rare books that is both informed and inspirational. The result is also timely: many trained architects are now incorporating natural materials into their buildings and drawing inspiration from popular dwellings. Ironically, the Mexican countryside is itself experiencing a shift towards "modern" materials and forms: these pages are the last record of centuries of tradition.

The Traditional Architecture of Mexico

Sayer, Chloë

Architecture

Thames&Hudson

Con un infinito respeto, Mariana registra las expresiones populares. Nada hay en ella del fotógrafo al acecho de las más violentas emociones, no quiere que la envíen a donde está la acción. Su guerra es otra y es muy honda. A veces se siente culpable de no gozar la vida urbana, de no haberse dedicado a las contradicciones de la ciudad, el amontonamiento de seres humanos, el smog, la agresión, el desamor...

La raíz y el camino (Colección Río de luz) (Spanish Edition)

Photography & Video

FONDO DE CULTURA ECONOMICA*

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Books by Yampolsky, Mariana