For a decade, Serra Pelada evoked the long-promised El Dorado as the world’s largest open-air gold mine, employing some 50,000 diggers in appalling conditions. Today, Brazil’s gold rush is merely the stuff of legend, kept alive by a few happy memorie s, many pained regrets—and Sebastião Salgado’s photographs. This collection is a major document of modern history and an extraordinary photographic portfolio.