Reply #19: The photographer is dead [View All]

http://www.artcult.com/na181.html

Alberto Diaz Guttierez called Korda, a Cuban photographer who immortalised revolutionary leader Ernesto Che Guevara with a shot taken in 1960, died of a heart attack during a visit to Paris on May 25th 2001 at 72. His legendary photograph, for which Korda did not obtain a cent in terms of copyrights until last year, became the emblem of several young generations. It had been taken during a funeral service at Havana on March 6th 1960. Such photograph became after some cunning retouching a kind of icon pinned on the walls of so many students’ rooms throughout the 20th Century.

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It was during the burial ceremony held for the 80 victims of a bomb attack in the harbour of Havana that he managed to catch glimpse of the Che and took two quick photographs of the latter. Such photograph was regarded as one of the hundred best taken during the 20th Century. He took his first shot in a horizontal position and the second vertically and decided to work on the former erasing the profile of a man
and a palm tree on the left of it. However, it was after Che Guevara was killed by Bolivian soldiers in October 1967 that such photo was published. It then became a mythical image but Korda did not perceive any copyright fees as Cuba had not signed the Bern Convention on intellectual property.

Korda never complained and limited himself to stressing that such photo had served the Cuban cause. He however decided to sue a British advertising agency which had used his photo for a campaign promoting the Smirnoff vodka brand and obtained damages amounting to $ 50,000 that he immediately offered to a charity fund.

Korda, who worked for the “Revolucion” periodical from 1959 produced the portraits of most leaders of the Cuban Communist regime and covered many official events in Cuba. Many of his other portraits of Che Guevara were exhibited around the world.

It was Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, a Milan-base publisher and staunch admirer of the Cuban revolution, who used Korda’s photo to produce a poster. At least one million posters offered at $ 5 each were sold around the world with a Feltrinelli copyright marking whereas Korda did not perceive a cent on these. Such photo also appeared on millions of postcards, tee-shirts, scarves, newspapers and tons of other objects.