For nearly a decade, Italian photographer Alessandro Cinque has devoted his career to capturing one of today's most pressing yet overlooked conflicts: the devastating impact of the mining industry on Indigenous communities throughout the Andes Mountains. His comprehensive photographic project, "El Precio de la Tierra" (The Price of the Land), represents the culmination of extensive travels through Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, and Ecuador, weaving together territories, cultures, and human destinies into a powerful visual narrative of resistance, loss, and dignity.
Cinque's transformative journey began in 2017 when he left his comfortable life and moved to South America, driven by an urgent need to document a reality he felt compelled to witness firsthand. The Florence-born photographer has developed a distinctive approach rooted in classical documentary photography, emphasizing simplicity and clarity as essential tools for visual democratization. According to Cinque, photography must remain a universal language that is both accessible and capable of fostering empathy and awareness, serving as a medium that translates complex global issues like climate change and Indigenous rights into tangible human experiences.
Over the years, Cinque has refined a meticulous working method that combines deep field immersion, collaborative partnerships with local journalists and activists, and profound ethical reflection on the photographer's role in representing marginalized communities. His project "El Precio de la Tierra" represents the full maturity of this practice, going beyond mere denunciation of extractivism's effects to restore complexity, agency, and dignity to the communities living within these challenging circumstances. The photographer works at the intersection of documentation and poetry, constructing a narrative that spans multiple countries and cultures to reveal how identical extractive dynamics repeat throughout the entire Andean region.
Cinque's distinctive perspective connects devastated landscapes including polluted rivers, hollowed-out mountains, and barren salt deserts with the faces of those who continue to resist, transforming simple observation into powerful testimony and photography into a tool of collective memory. Under the expert guidance of Sarah Leen, former Director of Photography at National Geographic, and curator and editor Santiago Escobar-Jaramillo of Raya Editorial, the project has evolved into a comprehensive visual chronicle of contemporary neocolonialism, addressing critical issues including energy transition, environmental degradation, and the remarkable resilience of Indigenous cultures.
The photographer's extensive experience in Latin America has fundamentally reshaped his artistic vision and approach to documentary work. Raised in Florence, a city deeply steeped in Eurocentric heritage and traditions, Cinque gradually redefined his visual language through sustained contact with Andean culture and the profound influence of photography masters such as Martín Chambi. This meaningful cross-cultural dialogue has produced what he describes as a decolonized and relational form of photography, grounded in equality between subject and photographer and driven by a genuine desire to make photography a powerful tool of restitution and social justice.
Over time, "El Precio de la Tierra" has transformed from a personal artistic endeavor into something much more significant: a living archive built in close collaboration with the communities portrayed, based on mutual trust and long-term commitment to their stories. The specialized fanzines produced in partnership with Quechua journalist Vidal Merma, distributed free of charge throughout Andean villages and now part of the permanent collection at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, represent one of the most tangible and meaningful expressions of this ethical vision and community-centered approach.
Through more than 320,000 photographs taken over nearly ten years of dedicated work, Cinque has constructed an impressive body of work that exists at the unique intersection of documentary photography, visual research, and anthropological study. His powerful images have been published in prestigious publications including The New York Times Magazine, National Geographic, The Guardian, Al Jazeera, and Internazionale, reaching audiences worldwide and bringing attention to these critical issues. The photographer's work has been exhibited in over 80 solo and group exhibitions across 27 countries, including Italy, France, Spain, the United States, Peru, Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Brazil, Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland, Portugal, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada, South Africa, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, and Turkey.
Among the most notable and prestigious venues that have showcased Cinque's work are the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego, Fotografiska in both Stockholm and Shanghai, Fundación PROA in Buenos Aires, and Arter in Istanbul. His exceptional contributions to documentary photography have earned him numerous prestigious recognitions, including the World Press Photo award, Sony World Photography Award, Prix Photo Terre Solidaire, Vital Impacts Grant, and the highly competitive National Geographic Explorer Grant.
With "El Precio de la Tierra," Alessandro Cinque delivers the most profound and comprehensive synthesis of his artistic and human journey to date. This remarkable work successfully merges photography, anthropology, and civic engagement, transforming the photographic image into a dynamic space of resistance, collective memory, and shared awareness that continues to inspire action and understanding worldwide.
