The expressive power of mountains and stock markets share certain aspects in common. Both have an emotional force; they can awaken feelings of happiness, yet they also carry components of risk within them. Both have the power to destroy lives.
Michael Najjar’s photographs draw a visual comparison between the forces of nature and those in the modern economy. Cliff and rock formations in these sweeping horizons portray volatility in the world’s leading stock exchange markets over the past 20-30 years. Pairing pure natural beauty with the development of the global financial system, a virtual value system is mapped.
High Altitude is based on the German photographer’s three week expedition up Mount Aconcagua in the Argentinean Andes in January 2009. At 22,800 feet, Aconcagua is the highest mountain in the world outside of the Himalayas.
“The reality of nature and the life rhythm of a mountain cannot be measured on any human scale and thus becomes a virtual experience. Such experience of virtuality can also be found on the international economic and financial markets where the staggeringly large sums of money circulating the globe in real time defy our powers of comprehension.” -Michael Najjar
