Moments in Eden

Twilight burns on the horizon as the day sets on Pakistan’s Indus River. As the sun moves along the shallow waters, beneath breaking clouds, it hits the chests of two Mohanis fishermen donning bird masks––a 5,000-year hunting tradition. The image is ablaze with empyrean imagery, as if it could signify the beginning or the end of the world. 

‍

The moment was captured in 2001 by Randy Olson, a longtime National Geographic photographer and founder of The Photo Society, and is one of over 120 artist-selected photographs that are available this week in “Eden,” Magnum Photos and The Photo Society’s Square Print Sale. The online-only sale features a collection of images from across the globe, captured by the groups’ photographers, and celebrates the beauty of the world's ecosystems and humanity's role––as stewards, witnesses, photographers––underscoring the need to preserve the planet.

There is a numinous quality throughout the images of rainforests, oceans, plains, and human infrastructure—much aligned with the Biblical story from which the collection gets its name. In one Stephen Wilkes photograph from 1999, a woman gazes at a breaking thunderstorm at the horizon of the Bahamas, as blue mist amalgamates the ocean and the sky. Another, a black-and-white photo by Elliot Erwitt taken in Argentina in 2001, shows a Pepsi billboard and a sculpture of Jesus’s crucifixion standing side-by-side in a clash of commercial and religious imagery. 

‍

This collection reflects both Magnum Photos and the Photo Society’s longstanding history of calling attention to the importance of the natural environment and the medium of photography. In 1947, Magnum Photos was formed as a global cooperative to provide support and independence to documentary photographers. In 2011, The Photo Society followed suit when a community of National Geographic photographers banded together to fight to retain their copyrights and empower photojournalists around the world. Now, as the planet’s natural environment dissipates, environmental photography is particularly crucial. The images shown in “Eden,” which span decades of documentary photography, embody the importance of protecting the planet––and the medium that cherishes it. 

‍

The Eden Square Print Sale runs until October 27 at store.magnumphotos.com.

‍