Sebastiào Salgado

Sebastiào Salgado is a prominent Brazilian photographer, most well known for his social documentaries and photojournalist works. Born in Aimorés, Minas Gerais, Brazil Salgado made the choice of disembark of the career path of becoming an economist and switched his focus of study on photography. Originally, he began working on news assignment before ultimately going towards the direction of photographic documentary work. Working at many different photo agencies Delgado was able to gain experience and hone his personal style of photography, and eventually founded his own agency along with his wife Lélia Wanick Salgado, Amazonas Images.

Sebastiào Salgado went from traveling the world as an economists to taking photographic documentaries in order for people to see what he saw when he traveled for his job. Often impactful pictures, Salgado made sure the world could see the conditions the people in different parts of the world had to deal with. One of most popular series was his photographs of coffee workers from India, Guatemala, Ethiopia and Brazil. It was popular because he exposed the many conditions put upon the workers by these big coffee companies, raising awareness of the origins of the popular drink by presenting it in front of the national stage, at the Brazilian Embassy in London. Along with that, he is also a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and has been one since 2001, winning many awards on his way to world acclaim.

The many photographs that Salgado takes are often reliant upon the environment which he is in, which brings the best and most out of each photographs. He not only uses the environment to the best of his ability but also the people. Somehow always portraying the emotion each person was feeling at the time of the picture taken, and one can truly see the what that person has been through or t least a glimpse of it through his pictures. I really enjoyed Sebastiào Salgado's work because of how well the environment and people blend so well together with no signs of tempering or fixing from the photographer himself.