"Questa San Blas, Cuzco, Peru"

Nr. 231115

gelatin silver print (analogue)

The photograph shows an old alleyway in the Peruvian city of Cuzco in backlight. Until the 16^th century and the colonization by the Spanish, Cuzco was the capital of the Inca Empire. When the hidden city of Machu Picchu was discovered at the beginning of the 20^th century, the significance of the city of Cuzco, located only 100 kilometers away, changed. It became the center of renewed interest in the indigenous past. At the same time, Cuzco developed into the largest tourist center in Peru. In 1950, just four years before Bischof took this photograph, a large part of the city was destroyed by an earthquake.
At the beginning of 1954, photojournalist Werner Bischof embarked on an extended reporting trip through Latin America for his agency Magnum – from Mexico to Panama, Chile, and Peru. However, on May 16, 1954, he crashed in an off-road vehicle driven by a local chauffeur in a gorge in the Peruvian Andes, killing all occupants.¹
(Christoph Fuchs, translated by DeepL)

1
"Der Unvergessene", in: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, May 15, 2004, cited in Wikipedia

Details of the trip, including photos, can be found on the website of the Estate of Werner Bischoff.