Genesis, published by Guest Editions, is the culmination of five years' work, in which Brenner documented the Highland area and people of his home country.
With a focus on youth culture in the region, Brenner captures a new generation of Guatemalans, the first to establish an intelligible dialogue with their contemporaries around the world.
In its entirety, Genesis is an extensive study of Highland society, exploring the history, nuance, and complexity of everyday life. Brenner's photography captures a territory that is in the midst of great change, with a set intention to document the “process of becoming.
From the fallout of the Spanish invasion of Guatemala in the 16th century, to the legacy of colonial rule, Brenner uses cultural history throughout Genesis to inform his research and photography - all while looking to the future of the region.
Juan Brenner said:
“At first, I wanted to learn more about myself and my place in this territory.
The more I worked on Genesis, the less it became about me and the more it evolved into an archive of a moment in time. The Highlands are so dense and rich with stimulus that it’s hard to digest everything at once when you’re there.”
A self-taught photographer, Juan Brenner lives in Guatemala City.
Having worked in New York as a fashion photographer for over a decade, Brenner returned to his native Guatemala, where he began making work about the people and complex territory in the country’s Western Highlands.
Genesis includes 360 pages filled with images of people and places of the Guatemalan Highlands, together with extensive texts and place descriptions.
Juan Brenner added:
“I’ve never worked in this way where my subject matter was changing so much. I started seeing changes in scenes I’d already shot—things can change abruptly here, including new roads, houses, and architecture.
Gen Z in the Highlands is the first generation to be 100% interconnected with the world. And that’s just happened in the last five years.
It might be another 25 years before we know the significance of this archive, but I knew it was important to document. In 2023, I stopped making this work because I had to draw a line, but the territory is ever-changing.”
The book further includes an essay by writer Julio Serrano, and a transcript of several conversations between Juan Brenner and Gem Fletcher.
Genesis is available to pre-order from the Guest Editions website, and will be released in mid October.
A launch event and signing for Genesis will be held at Photobook Cafe, London, on Thursday 14th November.
About Guest Editions
Guest Editions is an independent publishing house, gallery and creative studio based in London, partnering with some of the most exciting artists working in the fields of contemporary, documentary and fine art photography today.
Guest Editions takes a fiercely collaborative approach to provide a platform that is true to an artist's vision and the story being told. Creating projects that broaden perspectives, share viewpoints and connect people.
About Juan Brenner
Juan Brenner is a self-taught photographer, lives and works in Guatemala City.
After working in New York as a fashion photographer for over a decade, Brenner returned to his native Guatemala where he began making work about the people and complex territory in the country’s Western Highlands.
Juan uses photography to reflect on the fluidity and abstract nature of identity and territory, his images capture the complexities of cultural hybridization and, more poignantly, the way power, hierarchical structures and inequality are instrumentally continued through time.
Brenner’s first monograph, Tonatiuh, was shortlisted for the 2019 Paris Photo–Aperture Foundation First PhotoBook Award. For the same project, he was a winner of LensCulture’s 2019 Emerging Talent Awards.
He is a founding member of Proyectos Ultravioleta in Guatemala City.
@juan_brenner
