Sebastião Salgado, Amazônia, Signed Sumo Book, Black & White Photographic Print

This SUMO-sized Art Edition (No. 1–100), designed by Lélia Wanick Salgado and signed by Sebastião Salgado, is presented with a clothbound companion volume, the signed print Adão Yawanawá in a headdress of eagle feathers. Village of Nova Esperança, Rio Gregório Yawanawá Indigenous Territory, state of ACRE (2016), and a bookstand designed by Renzo Piano.Also available in three other Art Editions of 100 copies each and in a signed Collector’s Edition of 2,000 copies (No. 401–2,400)Sebastião Salgado traveled the Brazilian Amazon and photographed the unparalleled beauty of this extraordinary region for six years: the forest, the rivers, the mountains, the people who live there—an irreplaceable treasure of humanity.In the book’s foreword Salgado writes: “For me, it is the last frontier, a mysterious universe of its own, where the immense power of nature can be felt as nowhere else on earth. Here is a forest stretching to infinity that contains one-tenth of all living plant and animal species, the world’s largest single natural laboratory.” This connection to nature is echoed in Renzo Piano's bookstand design, of which he says it “is the simplest way to have the book in levitation. You do not even see the bookstand, you just see the book held in the air firmly. The open pages look like an albatros while flying.” Made from mild steel with powder coated painting, threaded central rods and rubber adjustable feet, the lectern was designed exclusively for the Amazônia project.Salgado visited a dozen indigenous tribes that exist in tiny communities scattered across the largest tropical rainforest in the world. He documented the daily life of the Yanomami, the Asháninka, the Yawanawá, the Suruwahá, the Zo’é, the Kuikuro, the Waurá, the Kamayurá, the Korubo, the Marubo, the Awá, and the Macuxi—their warm family bonds, their hunting and fishing, the manner in which they prepare and share meals, their marvelous talent for painting their faces and bodies, the significance of their shamans, and their dances and rituals.Gelatin silver print on Ilford FB warmtone paper, 19.9 x 14.6 in. on 23.6 x 19.7 in. paper; hardcover volume, 27.6 x 19.9 in., 24.9 kg (54.78 lb), 472 pages; caption book, 10 x 13.7 in., 32 pages; bookstand made from mild steel with powder coated painting and rubber adjustable feet, 35.4 x 15.2 x 44.7 in., 46 kg (101.4 lb).