From post-truth to the pandemic, climate crisis to global conflicts, current times seem dominated by distrust and division. Yet it also makes room for seeking out meaningful connections – to each other and the world at large.

 

When do we ever really share our inner worlds? Deep connection is a rare gift. There's so much we don't know about the people closest to us, how can we begin to relate to the experiences of others – whether that be from living in a different country, or from experiencing the horrors of a war zone or natural disaster? The photographer's role, particularly as a photojournalist, is to get under the surface, to break down barriers and get to the 'truth'. 

 

'Let Me In' features 6 Magnum photographers - presenting works from the 1950s to today - that explore intimacy and photography's ambiguous relationship to truth. They all move beyond traditional documentary photography through subtle narratives, merging fiction and reality, with intense emotional and psychological engagement.

 

If the artworks are of interest, please get in touch.

 

Sincerely, Diana

b. 1970, Canada 

JOINED MAGNUM IN 2007

EXPLORING TRUTH & INTIMACY 

“I finally understood what a picture can be about - it’s about responding to a moment that’s important to you… I wasn’t trying to make a good photograph, or tell a story. I was literally communicating how I felt.”

Christopher Anderson's work is emotionally charged. Though rooted in war reportage, today his work captures more intimate and personal moments with his family – all linked in its ability to position the viewer as part of the scene. Anderson's work invites 'us', the viewer, 'in', sharing how he felt during these carefully chosen moments. His photographs of his daughter 'Pia' are beautiful, yet mysterious. We're drawn into her world by her presence, but so much remains unknown, emphasised by a shadow hiding her features or an enigmatic far-off gaze. 

b. 1971, AUSTRALIA 
JOINED MAGNUM IN 2007

"For me, it's all about emotional connection."

Trent Parke is recognised for his dramatic and highly emotive images of his home country, Australia, shot in stark black & white tones. In his series 'Minutes to Midnight' and 'The Seventh Wave', he places us, the viewer, at the heart of the action. In 'After the rodeo' the energy of the horses is palpable, their restless intensity captured in seemingly perpetual motion. In 'Bondi Beach', his swimmers similarly twist and turn. He invites us to share in this intense and turbulent moment, as if we were swimming alongside them. 

b. 1975, SPAIN 
ASSOCIATE MAGNUM member since 2019

Does De Middel’s veil of mysticism allow us to get closer to the truth?

Cristina de Middel is part storyteller, part scenographer and part documentary photographer. Moving away from traditional photojournalism, she has embraced fantasy and the surreal to build a more nuanced portrayal of reality. De Middel's series 'This Is What Hatred Did' is a reimagination of Amos Tutuola's 1954 novel 'My Life in the Bush of Ghosts', set in the streets of Makoko, a floating village in the city of Lagos, Nigeria. Weaving fact with fiction, she shines a light on the challenges of navigating trust, in times of conflict and abuse of power. Through a collaborative process, De Middel gives her subjects agency in how they wish to be seen. 

b. 1976, DENMARK
JOINED MAGNUM IN 2012

© Jacob Aue Sobol / Magnum Photos 

“In spite of photography’s seemingly concrete form, I hope to expose layers in people that are not immediately visible, but nonetheless shape who we are and give meaning to our lives.”

Jacob Aue Sobol has developed a unique, high-contrast style of black & white photography, which is both poetic and raw. He gets up close to his subjects using the camera as a way to connect and capture intimate, yet unsentimental images. In 'Tokyo' 2007, a girl on the subway is pressed into a confined space, her raised hands reveal an attempt to push all that surrounds her away. Amongst the close proximity, even stifling claustrophobia at times, we can sense the loneliness and distance between people. 

b. 1969, USA
JOINED MAGNUM IN 2008

Alec Soth is a documentary photographer and poet. His large-format colour images of people and scenes from America's disconnected communities drill down to the essence of his subjects. His series 'Niagara' portrays a town, where people go to get married – known as the 'romance capital'. But the reality is something else, drawing an inevitable comparison with the hollowness of the American Dream. Symbols of romance such as the kissing swans in 'Two Towels' 2004 become bleak set against the beige, cracked walls of a motel room. His portrait of 'Misty' 2007 is striking. There's a power to her mystery, the suggestion of a narrative, but so much is left undisclosed. 

1923 - 2002, AUSTRIA & 1914 - 1999, ROMANIA
MORATH JOINED MAGNUM IN 1953

                               Inge Morath, 'Untitled' (from the Saul Steinberg Mask series), 1961 

"Of course [a mask is] something that’s useful, it’s necessary, but it’s also something ugly, because it takes away all the poetry, the spontaneity of life from people.”

Inge Morath was a prolific writer and photographer. In 1956, she met the cartoonist Saul Steinberg, and they began a fascinating creative collaboration, titled the 'Mask Series'. The images offer at first glance a playful and even humorous take on New York's Upper East Side grandeur in post-war America. Both European, Steinberg and Morath were outsiders looking in. By concealing their subjects faces, in some ways they end up telling us more, revealing a far eerier and suggestively sinister side to the 1950s American Dream.