Moral of the history

viniciusmatos

13 anos ago

Crazy and saints

I choose my friends not by their skin or other archetype, but by the pupil.

They have to have questioning shine and unsettled tone.

I’m not interested in the good spirits or the ones with bad habits.

I’ll stick with the ones that are made of me being crazy and blessed.

From them, I don’t want an answer, I want to be reviewed.

I want them to bring me doubts and fears and to tolerate the worst of me.

But that only being crazy.

I want saints, so they daunt doubt differences and ask for forgiveness for injustices.

I choose my friends for their clean face and their soul exposed.

I don’t just want a man or a skirt, I also want his greatest happiness.

A friend that doesn’t laugh together doesn’t know how to cry together.

All my friends are like that, half foolish, half serious.

I don’t want foreseen laughter or cries full of pity.

I want serious friends, those that make reality their fountain of knowledge, but that fight to keep fantasy alive.

I don’t want adult or boring friends.

I want half kids and half elderly.

Kids, so they don’t forget the value of the wind blowing on their faces and elderly people so they’re never in a hurry.

I have friends to know who I am.

Then seeing them as clowns and serious, crazy and saints, young and old, I will never forget that ‘normalcy’ is a sterile and imbecile illusion.

Oscar Wilde

In October, I photographed the talented and friendly poet, Joaquín Perez Azaústre and his lovely wife Maria Del Mar, and I can say it was an nonsuch marriage. Indeed all have their brilliance, but this was something very different. The bright, inquisitive and restless pupils recited by Oscar Wilde, remember?

The couple, their family and friends made me feel very special. When I set foot in the city of Cordoba, Spain, I had no idea what was to come. I was welcomed in a “warm,” sensitive and unexpected way. These people made me feel so special. Literally at home in such a sort time together. Many delicacies, siesta, spoiling and lots of interesting stories, beyond the key, that’s right, they handed me the key of honorary citizen, even if temporary. It was very intense.

Pause for questions … who does not like affection? Who does not want to feel valued?

There were many surprises, difficult to explain how these people are kind and how they value those who surround them. A wedding with interesting people, an intensive course of life 2 days long that still leaves peaces in digestion inside my mind heart.

Photographed intriguing and also very interested people. A photogenic wedding, smeared with poetry, fantastic details such as tables with the specific characteristics of the groups that sat on them. Mine was customized, the photography table, with plaque and all. Good music, good wine, smiles, tobacco (a lot of tobacco), dancing, happy people, characters and caricatures. I was enraptured, trying to understand what was in the mind of each one who was there while taking pictures of them. It was like a movie. Sometimes in slow motion, others in advance 24X. I got get closer to people than usual. They, with open arms, lived with my lenses without giving it much concern. They did, and did not care for me. When we let ourselves to feel at ease, doors then creak open.

End of party, quick shower at the hotel, drive to Seville, delayed flight, 36 hours on the return trip to home and forced pause for reflection. Only then I could understand and assimilate that photography is not only therapy and profession but also it is a powerful agent of change. Especially when one is open-hearted or, in my case, so tired that could not fight against such learning. The photography is also hard and showed me a lot of “cosas” in only a couple of days. I came home with some more pieces of the puzzle in their proper places.

I photographed three other weddings after Joaquín and Maria’s. As my photography is a mirror of who I am and reflection of my attitudes, I shall stop to reflect and understand what and why of what I saw. Enough always trying to follow the moral of the story.

Moral: sometimes to be so well treated like that way even hurts. It means to take stock and feel small and the obligation to change the relationship with people. So follow my evolution as a photographer and as a person, but not necessarily in that order.

Below, scenes of the next chapters …