Martin Parr’s Eye for Human Folly

Martin Parr, who died in December, at the age of seventy-three, had a specific paint color in mind for the first room of “Global Warning,” a retrospective of his photographs that’s currently on display at the Jeu de Paume, in Paris. The show’s curator, Quentin Bajac, had suggested that they go with something classic—i.e., white—but Parr was very clear that he wanted a more exuberant hue. The one he chose might commonly be called bubblegum, but anyone who’s visited the show may be inclined to think of it forever after as Parr Pink: the pink of a hibiscus on a garishly printed bikini bottom, of bootleg perfume bottles, of diaper packages and cookie icing; the pink of slack mouths and dangling uvulas and nostrils shown so close up that you can see every last busted blood vessel, suggesting a lifetime of excess in a world of overconsumption.