Ernesto Bazan

Ernesto Bazan was born in 1959 in Palermo, Italy. He received his first camera at age 14. He started photographing daily life both in his native city and in the Sicilian countryside.

In 1979, he moved to New York to attend the School of Visual Arts. In 1982, he received a B.F.A with a major in photography. The same year, he won the Young Photographers contest in Arles and was one of the youngest photographers to join the photo agency Magnum. The following year, he won the “Photo Reportage News” contest in Arles. These first two prizes allowed him to take a seven-month trip across Asia sponsored by the French magazine Paris Match. In 1984, he left the agency Magnum of his own accord.

Bazan has had shows both in Europe and the US and his images have been widely collected by collectors and museums including the MOMA and ICP in New York, the SFMOMA, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, the South East Museum of Photography in Daytona, the Fondazione Italiana della Fotografia in Turin, the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and the Musee Rattau in Arles. His work has been widely published by many magazines including Life, Time, News Week, Natural History, Cigar Aficionado, Max, Sette, lo Donna among others.

Also in 1992, he discovered the island of Cuba. This encounter has thoroughly changed his life, both professionally and personally. He began documenting the unique time in Cuban history referred to as El Periodo Especial (The Special Period). This ongoing project has given Bazan the privilege to win some of the most coveted photographic prizes in the world which includes among others a grant from Mother Jones Foundation for Photojournalism (1995); two grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts (1996, 2000); first prize in the daily life story category at the World Press Photo competition (1996); two fellowships, one from Alicia Patterson Foundation (1997) and the Guggenheim Foundation (2000); the Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize (1997); the W. Eugene Smith grant (1998); a grant from the Fund for Investigative Journalism (2000).

His Books include: The Perpetual Past, 1985; Passing Through, 1992.

To see his work:
www.bazanphotos.com