Pompidou Centre Paris features previously unseen photographs by legendary Czech photographer Josef Koudelka in one of his exhibitions among the numerous programmes this year, which marks its 40th anniversary.
Koudelka, who came to world fame with his photographs made during the 1968 invasion by the troops of Warsaw Pact countries, left his home country Czechoslovakia in 1970. After that, he has been almost constantly on the move for decades, with a single backpack, as a modern nomad.
He slept open-air while photographing gipsy communities around Europe, and in the intervals, he has found a temporary home at his friends’ place in Paris and London, or took one-night stands at the Paris bureaus of Magnum photo agency, sleeping in a sleeping bag on the floor.
The exhibition La Fabrique d’Exiles (Making of the Exiles) includes works from this period that previously have not been showed to he public. Some of the prints have been made specially for this occasion.
Also for the first time, the show features self-portraits by Koudelka he made during his years of his constant wandering, as well as contact sheets. All in all, visitors can get an insight into the making of his Exiles series.
The exhibition at Centre Pompidou is his first in Paris since the 1988 introduction of the series.
In the 1970s and 1980 he criss-crossed Europe for his projects. His Exiles photographs are testimonies not only on their subjects, but also on Koudelka’s love for and pursuit of freedom. 'I photograph only something that has to do with me, and I never did anything that I did not want to do’ – he said The Guardian in a 2008 interview.
Exiles was also published in a photobook, first in 1988 and in 2014 as an extended edition. ‚Koudelka’s unsentimental, stark, brooding, intensely human imagery reflect his own spirit, the very essence of an exile who is at home wherever his wandering body finds haven in the night“ - wrote Cornell Capa on this book.
The next big shot of Pompidou Centre for the lovers of photography will be an exhibitions from the oeuvre of Walker Evans, to be seen from the 26th of April.
