© Nereo López, 1950s, Colombia’s Traveling Storyteller

Nereo López is arguably one of the most accomplished Colombian photographers of his — or any — generation, always on the move as he chronicled the famous and the obscure, the powerful and the dispossessed.

As one who came of age during photojournalism’s golden age, Mr. López followed the lead of magazines like Look and Life, but he forsook their American perspective for his own. By the middle of the last century, he was documenting his own country with the same dedication and talent as any of his American or European counterparts. His images show heroism in the daily struggles of his countrymen. It is a sincere, unvarnished yet empathetic look that helped Colombia understand itself. (read more)