Work
Koudelka's early work significantly shaped his later photography, and its emphasis on social and cultural rituals as well as death. He soon moved on to a more personal, in depth photographic study of the Gypsies of Slovakia, and later Romania. This work was exhibited in Prague in 1967. Throughout his career, Koudelka has been praised for his ability to capture the presence of the human spirit amidst dark landscapes. Desolation, waste, departure, despair and alienation are common themes in his work. His characters sometimes seem to come out of fairytales. Still, some see hope within his work — the endurance of human endeavor, in spite of its fragility. His later work focuses on the landscape removed of human subjects.
Read more about this topic: Josef Koudelka
Famous quotes containing the word work:
“Your children get a lot of good stuff out of your work...They benefit from the tales you tell over dinner. They learn from the things you explain to them about what you do. They brag about you at school. They learn that work is interesting, that it has dignity, that it is necessary and pleasing, and that it is a perfectly natural thing for both mothers and fathers to do...Your work enriches your children more than it deprives them.”
—Louise Lague (20th century)
“Even the wisest man grows tense
With some sort of violence
Before he can accomplish fate,
Know his work or choose his mate.
Poet and sculptor, do the work,
Nor let the modish painter shirk”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The great work must inevitably be obscure, except to the very few, to those who like the author himself are initiated into the mysteries. Communication then is secondary: it is perpetuation which is important. For this only one good reader is necessary.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)