Patagonia Gallery
Ecuador 2004
® Alessandro Iasevoli
Latin America, Travelling and Photography are 3 of my great passions.
When I heard about an Italian photographer living in Cuba and giving 11-day workshop in Ecuador I immediately realized that that mix could have been explosive for me!
Ernesto didn’t pontificate on how to make good pictures but he simply took us with him around on Ecuadorian roads and country villages along with his unceasing curiosity to discover amazing places, situations and people. Pictures came later.
Besides the beauty of the trip and the value of the people with which I shared 11 full great days of life and photography, the major teaching I got from Ernesto was about the magic of photography.
Working with him helped me understand that the big majority of pictures that we believe are good pictures are missing something: the magic.
This new approach requires looking beyond the mere descriptive, to search that element(s) that although apparently insignificant makes the picture. A glance, an expression, a gesture, a line or a rare combination of seemingly disorganized elements, which harmonize in that fraction of a second when you press the shutter.
Besides the fact that each of us came back home with 10 good pictures, the most important result from this workshop has been the acquisition of a look toward the second level reality, which is not seen immediately and where it’s often hidden the magic of the picture.
The other great teaching the workshop gave me was to capture that hidden presence with a very strict selection. Only a severe editing process may help the magic to emerge from the myriad of pictures taken, allowing only those images that go beyond the mere documentary approach to survive.
Now I look at the 10 selected pictures that survived Ernesto’s wild editing. The more I look at them the greater is the temptation to edit them again, to “kill” them further, and leave only 1 or none. So that with no good pictures selected, I would have an excuse to catch the first flight to Latin America and join the next BazanPhotos’ workshop and run after the magic once again. Alessandro Iasevoli
® Alvaro Chiappini
® Frank Baudino
Ecuador: a truly amazing place. I found much to admire in the generosity of the people–they welcomed us with open arms. We approached a hacienda in Giron as total strangers–five rather scruffy looking foreigners with cameras–and were told to sit down and have some breakfast and a drink. We were asked to regard their house as our house. We were permitted to photograph with total freedom the ceremony of the bulls. We were able to make some truly powerful images. I cannot think of any place in America where something like this would have happened.
Another wonderful memory was photographing a small circus in Cuenca. The “big top” circus tent was tattered and small but the images we obtained were beautiful. The performers were four young men who shared duties as clowns, singers, acrobats, fire eaters, and animal trainers (a llama was the only circus animal). The clowns were amazingly funny and I shared the laughter of the audience as they poked fun at everything imaginable.
It is difficult to speak from the heart about some aspects of Ecuador: the grinding poverty of the countryside contrasts with the ostentation of Ecuadorians who struck it rich in America; the brutality of the slaughter of the bulls is juxtaposed with the necessary sacrifice of animals for food. I went to Ecuador to experience life more fully and I was not disappointed.
Over the eleven days of the workshop we ate, slept, and dreamed photography. We also began to experience and understand the Ecuadorian culture in which we had immersed ourselves. During the final days in Quito we struggled to edit well over 1000 frames each of us had taken down to ten images. We had great fun passionately arguing about, defending, and becoming “emotionally attached” (and unattached) to our images. Ultimately, our final ten images express a very personal vision of life in Ecuador that goes beyond mere surface description and transcends reality. Frank Baudino
® Wendell Hammon
As my mind wanders through the streets, plazas, animal, markets, pueblos and countryside of Ecuador, I still see images of things I’ll never forget, of things that I want to shoot again, of moments when I shot the perfect picture that didn’t show up on contacts while I replay the stories that go with them.
Of course, the workshop provided quite a “process” for learning and improving while working with some wonderful photographers whose help gave me that extra push to go after the moment, to try new ideas, to compose more than a picture.
Opportunities abound in travel to record incredible memories of everyday life in my mind and with my camera. Even being tear gassed in the streets opened my eyes to what the people of Ecuador are all about. Passionate and driven in their quest to make their country work, to make it just, to live their lives.
As my mind zooms in on the experience I still see the photos, see the elements that make my images special and mine. I look at things through the lens of my mind in new ways as my photographic journey continues.
Wendell Hammon
