I’ve come back from Habana with a bit of a sour taste in my mouth.
Walking the streets in the various districts, sometimes I felt too embarrassed to even take the camera out.
Dozens of photographers looking like a hunting party were inspecting every corner of the streets, every face, every shadow, no stone left unturned.
In some culture, people don’t mind this. They welcome you with open arms and you can have a field day walking around with your big and obtrusive SLR with a huge zoom on top of it, making a Kalashnikov noise every time the shutter closes, nobody would mind.
But in some other cultures, people are more sensitive. Especially in those places where privacy is on of the few things left and where taking an unwanted photo can be seen as not respecting someone’s dignity.
A kid on a street was paying baseball with his friends. When a group of foreigners approached, he started screaming “no quiero foto” and covered his face with the baseball glove.
My camera was in the bag at that time but I felt his screamed acusation directed at me and at what photography has started to represent in some areas: intrusion, lack of respect, agression.
I like candid photography and I realize that it requires observing and photographing an unaware subject. But I feel is a big difference between being invisible to an environment, getting people used to you as being there, be part of the scenery so they don’t realize/care you’re taking a photo, and just showing up and start marching in uninvited in their lives, metaphorically speaking.
I’m not saying we should aim for getting Releas Forms from all the people we photograph, but sometimes just a look, a question, a gesture is enough to create a relation, get accepted, and gain trust.
Keep your camera out. Aproach first, ask, show understanding and respect. If they want to be photographed, they’ll wait for you, you’ll be able to put them in the right light, select your composition, do your work. At least show them the picture you’ve taken of them, before showing it to th world on www. IN the end, you may even part as friends.
Jun 032010