Join us in the R&D Store for an in-depth look at a pioneering Chicano photographer with a stunning new book, Louis Carlos Bernal: Monografía (Aperture). Elizabeth Ferrer is the curator of a new retrospective exhibition of Bernal’s work that preserves the legacy of the southwestern community portrayed in these photographs. Louis Carlos Bernal photographed in the wake of the 1970s US Civil Rights era and documented the barrio communities of the Southwest throughout the 1980s. For Bernal, photography was a potent tool in affirming the value of communities and individuals who lacked visibility and agency. Bernal’s work resonates with Catholicism, Indigenous beliefs, and popular practices tied to the land. Often photographing the interiors of homes and their inhabitants, his subjects are surrounded by the objects they lived with — framed portraits of family members, religious pictures and statuaries, small shrines festooned with flowers, and elements of contemporary popular culture. Bernal viewed these spaces as rich with personal, cultural, and spiritual meaning, and his unforgettable photographs express a vision of la vida cotidiana — everyday life — as a state of grace.