Pierre Verger

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Pierre Verger

Pierre Verger (actually: Pierre Édouard Léopold Verger ) (born November 4, 1902 in Paris , France , † February 11, 1996 in Salvador , Brazil ) was a French photographer , ethnologist, writer, Babaláwo and a founding member of the Photo Agency Alliance Photo. Verger became known for his research on the Yoruba and the transatlantic relations between Brazil and Africa. He can be seen as one of the pioneers of visual anthropology and has worked as a photographer in numerous cultural circles. In 1952, after his initiation as Babalawo, he took the name Fatumbi or Fátúmbí .

life and work

Pierre Verger comes from a middle-class German-Belgian family from Paris in the 16th arrondissement. His father was the owner of a printing company and, like the younger brother, died early. Verger was excluded from studying at the École Bréguet for disciplinary reasons and began working for his father's company at the age of 18. His mother's death on March 15, 1932 was the cause of a radical break with his previous bourgeois life. From now on, the rest of his life, which he puts at the age of 40, will be used for traveling and photography. Verger learned the basics of photography and the darkroom from his friend at the time, Pierre Boucher, using a Rolleiflex camera.

In December 1932, Verger and his friend, painter Eugène Huni, followed in the footsteps of Paul Gaugain and traveled to the Polynesian islands. On his return to Paris in 1934, Verger made the acquaintance of the co-director Georges Henri Rivière of the Musée de Trocadéro at the time, and from then on was in the company of Marcel Griaule , Michel Leiris and André Schaeffner. Verger takes on photo assignments for the museum and has the opportunity to exhibit his photographs in the group exhibition 'Photographies de la Polynesien Française' (1934).

Alliance Photo and career as a photo reporter (1934–1937)

Together with the photographers Pierre Boucher , René Zuber and Émeric Feher and the photographer Denise Bellon , Verger founded the Alliance Photo agency in Paris in December 1934. From now on he works for various newspaper publishers as a photographer. Paris-Soir engaged him for a six-month trip around the world, which took him to the USA, Japan and China as well as the Philippines and Singapore. During a bicycle trip along the Spanish Mediterranean coast in 1935, when the Spanish Civil War broke out, Verger was mistakenly mistaken for a German spy and imprisoned. His travel stops along the Mediterranean coast include: a. Barcelona, ​​Alicante, Granada, Córdoba, Seville and Málaga. The publisher Paul Hartmann takes a liking to the photographs from Spain and has worked together for years. In the same year Verger set out on his first trip to Africa (1935–36) and found his way through the Sahara to Dahomey, today's Benin, via Algeria with a Tuareg camel expedition. Here he meets former slaves from Brazil, the so-called 'Aguda', for the first time. In 1937 he reported on the Second Sino-Japanese War and was shocked by the violence and his own work as a photo reporter.

First trips to Central and South America and stays in Argentina and Peru (1937-1946)

Verger was in Mexico when World War II broke out. In February 1940 he reached Brazil via Guatemala and Ecuador and visited the cities of São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Petrópolis. After Verger volunteered for military service, he was recruited into a photographic military unit in Dakar. Here he meets his old friend Bernard Maupoli and the director of the Institut Français d'Afrique Noir (IFAN) Théodore Monod . After his demobilization, he returned to Brazil via Guinia-Bissau in the same year. From 1941 to 1942 Verger lived in Argentina with a group of Sinti and Roma and worked for the newspapers El Mundo Argentino and Argentina Libre. In 1942 Verger crossed Bolivia in the direction of Peru, which he reached in July of the same year. He got a job as a photographer in the National Museum of Lima to document the customs of the Quechua and Aymara Indians. He lived in Lima and Cusco for a total of five years.

Brazil (since 1946)

Verger travels from Peru via Bolivia to São Paulo, where the ethnologist Roger Bastide arouses his interest in African Brazil. Thanks to an activity for the weekly magazine 'O Cruzeiro', Verger received a residence permit and finally found a new center of life in Salvador. He made contacts with the sculptor Mario Cravo, the painter Carybé and the writer Jorge Amado , whom he had already met during an earlier stay in Rio de Janeiro and whose novel Jubiabá strengthened his interest in the country. With his work for O Cruzeiro, together with photographers such as Jean Manzon, Verger made a decisive contribution to the rise of Brazilian photo journalism. Together with the journalist Odorico Tavares, he wrote a report on the Canudos War in 1947 . In further photo series he is dedicated to the Afro-Brazilian culture in Salvador and captures Capoeira dances with his camera. His interest in the rituals of Candomblé and the culture of the Yoruba led to a scholarship from IFAN in Dakar. Verger documents the religious life of the Yoruba peoples in Benin in a total of 2000 photographs. Theodore Monod has Verger supplement his photographs with his own notes and observations. Little by little, Verger becomes a scientific researcher who also uses written sources to find out about the history of the transatlantic slave trade on site. In exchange with the 'Aguda', he learns their special role.

He himself speaks of his work as "'Ambassador' on the soil of Africa" ​​(Pierre Verger to Roger Bastide, Bahia)

Verger as a photographer

Pierre Verger's preference was for black and white photography with strong contrasts. His main motive was people he met on his travels.

Verger, who was born in Paris in 1902 and died in Bahia in 1996 , came from a well-to-do middle-class family.

In addition to photography, he devoted himself to ethnology and was a babalawo ( Yoruba priest).

literature

  • Jérôme Souty, Pierre Fatumbi Verger. Du Regard Détaché à la Connaissance initiatique , Maisonneuve & Larose, Paris, 2007. (520 p., 144 photos, French).
  • Manfred Metzner, Michael M. Thoss (eds.), Pierre Verger. Black gods in exile . From the Brazilian Portuguese by Margrit Klingler-Clavijo. Translated from the French by Beate Thill. Verlag Das Wunderhorn, Heidelberg 2004. ISBN 978-3-88423-223-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Short biography of Pierre Verger at Perlentaucher
  2. ↑ Jérôme Souty, Pierre Verger Fatumbi. Du régard détaché á la connaissance initiatique, Paris 2007, page 102.
  3. ↑ Pierre Verger in the wild Holy: Roger Bastide (1898-1974) and religious studies of Astrid Reuter , 2000, 410 pages, page 220th
personal data
SURNAME Verger, Pierre
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Verger, Pierre Edouard Leopold (full name); Fatumbi (religious name); Fátúmbí (religious name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French photographer
DATE OF BIRTH November 4, 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris , France
DATE OF DEATH February 11, 1996
Place of death Salvador , Brazil