GUP#14

Introduction

Film director Federico Fellini sat next to a fast-talking boy at school. They
called him ‘paparazzo’, taken from the Italian dialect for mosquito; irrritating
and intrusive by nature. Later in Fellini’s film ‘La Dolce Vita’, he gave the
same name to the character of a pushy press photographer who specialised
in wheedling his way into high society circuits. And so the term ‘paparazzi’
was born.

A good number of the images flooding our visual world today come
courtesy of the paparazzi. Magazines, newspapers, websites and TV
programs are all hot on the tails of celebrities. One can’t help but notice the
legacy of the paparazzi in full swing today. Nor the celebrities themselves
for that matter. Exposure is business, and for the Paris Hiltons of this world it
doesn’t matter if it’s positive or negative.

In this issue you will see work from established paparazzi, nevertheless in a
different context. We were curious if paparazzi photography is only vulgar and
superficial or does it have the capacity to uplift itself and become photo journalism
in its purest form or even art? Judge for yourself.