YEMEN REVIEWS
Yemen is so picturesque that it is notsurprising that photographers are captivated by its scenes andexpressive faces. Paola Crociani, now a Cairo resident, is an Italianphotographer who has traveled widely in the Middle East, includingYemen. She previously exhibited photographs at a conference in therestored caravanserai of Samsarat al-Nahhas in the old suq of Sanaa.Among the credits, it is worth noting, is Dr. Noha Sadek, theResident Director of AIYS in Yemen. The book has about a hundredblack-and-white photographs, all portraits of Yemenis from all partsof the country. Each picture is clearly labeled as to the location, afeature not always present in photo books. The book is available inEgypt and Yemen for about $25. I sort of doubt it would have much ofa market in the U.S.
I have often heard it said that it isdifficult to take a bad picture in Yemen, but I have learned to takethat with a grain of salt over the past several years. Perhaps we areso enamored of the subject that we let our critical eyes soft focusthe issue of quality. I have seen lots of poor quality photographs,some in major exhibitions. By poor quality I mean over-exposure,faces blackened by shadows and less than adequate framing. Whilethere are indeed some lovely shots in Crociani's volume, I find quitea few that come across in my eyes as poorly done.
Let's start with the positive (punintended). The most fascinating picture to my mind is that of thecover (and p. 22), a young girl with crossed (and hennacriss-crossed) arms. Here the shadows add charm; the girl's facetakes on some of the quality of the rough house facade. The cameraangle is superb with the girl's eyes gazing slightly above thereader's eye level. (I think I bought the book primarily because ofthis one picture.) Another interesting use of shadows on the eyes ison p. 8, a photo of a son of a dagger maker. Here the tassles of theboy's headdress shadow across the boy's face. The girl from Sanaa (p.20) is very nice, the girl's unkempt hair backed by a man walking byand out of focus. The young man in the Ta'izz spice shop (p. 29) iswell framed &emdash; a piece of rich detail not lost in the shadows.The Sanaa silversmith (p. 45) captures a quizzical look &emdash; avery effective use of shadows. The winner of the largest qatwad is clearly the mada'a maker on p. 52. Anothermada'a maker on p. 57 has a timely sense of movement. TheBedouin from Shabwa (p. 103) has the look of spontaneity, not alwayspresent in some of the forced smiles in other photos in the album.There are, quite clearly, some well thought-out photographs in thisvolume.
But as in real life, the proof is in thenegative. An unfortunate tendency I find in many of the portraits isa failure to battle and modify the negative effect of shadows. Froman artistic point of view, I realize that shadows can add to thepicture in a non-literal sense. I am certainly not suggesting thatall photographs be rigidly true to life (whatever that might mean).But a problem often arises in the failure to compensate for thoseshadows which obliterate and mar an image. A prime example is the oldman in 'Amran (p. 26), who sports little more than a shiny whitishnose. There is no face here &emdash; certainly no eyes &emdash; andan appeal to artistic license is as appealing as a poorly takentourist portrait. Similarly, there are several times where thewhite-washed faces really detract from the portrait (e.g., pp. 11,27, 75, 79, 84). I cannot help but think that the photographee wouldwant to tear the picture up in each of these cases. The framing attimes is rather disjointed, probably intentional, but I wonder towhat purpose. Consider the dagger maker on p. 65, where his knee iscut in half and we see part of the shoulder of someone else. We seetwo cases of splitting a face in half for the fishermen on pp. 32-33.This strikes me as odd, trying to salvage a frame rather than makinga statement photographically. The photograph of a man on p. 74 isvery light, as though it was very poor contrast on the negative andsalvaged (not very well) in the darkroom. How a picture this poor canup in such a collection mystifies me. This would be a much strongercollection if about a third of the photographs were simply left out.It looks as though the photographer was going forquantity.
Art is, of course, a matter of opinions. Thefaces here and the expressions recorded are more often than notcompelling. But unlike the more technically sophisticated photographyof Pascal and Maria Maréchaux, I find the overall quality ofthe portraits mixed. Some are quite nice; others are border-linerejects. That is a shame, because it really should be much harder totake bad pictures of Yemenis.
