Monday, July 23, 2007

klich-muller


photos by kent klich, essay by herta muller.
After James Agee and Walker Evans's testimony...
Remembering poignant books mixing text and photographs, such as this one, or Eltit's and Errazuriz, 'El infarto del alma'...

"The question which I had to ask myself so often in Romania is still relevant today: how much is a human life worth? As much money as it costs. But most people have no money. The state still has nothing to offer them, and they can give nothing to the state. For poor people, life is over very quickly. Because they have no money, they have no choice but to pay for everything with a handful of life. Without any choice, it is soon spent.

There is a Romanian proverb which says: A good person is worth as much as a piece of bread. This doesn´t say much for the value of the individual, but it says an awful lot about the value of bread. This kind of folk wisdom only evolves where there is no bread but a gread deal of hunger". (Herta Müller).

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