-ISBN: 84-87882-27-7
-Data: 2004. Edición bilingüe: galego-inglés.
-Fotografías e texto: José Ramón Bas.
-Ilustracións cor. 60 páxinas.
-Formato: 11 x 15 cm. Encadernación rústica.
-Prezo: 9 €
ESGOTADO
english below
A VIAXE IMPOSÍBEL
No tempo percorrido por todos nós hai sempre unha vinculación desigual coa realidade, a nosa e mais a relacionada con nós mesmos, todo se resume na manida palabra de nada é o que parece.
Malia todo encántanos almacenar, documentar as nosas inseguras vidas como se iso nos mercase un anaco de inmortalidade, que procuramos, e o peor que atopamos, ás veces un simple baleiro que atrae, unha sensación xélida, pero continuamos sen facérmonos demasiadas preguntas .
Ao comezo coa fotografía interesábame documentar as miñas viaxes pero máis como unha interpretación da miña propia memoria, servíame dela en todo momento, evitaba tomar notas e apreciacións na mesma viaxe. Quería a interpretación unha vez rematada a viaxe, distanciado, e dese xeito deixaba que a miña memoria se exercitase e realizase a interpretación libre. Daquela pensei nos ámbares que gardaban a memoria do noso planeta e experimentei coa resina de poliéster e as imaxes ían recubertas de resina. Tampouco non tiña ningún respecto por ningunha norma fotográfica convencional, así que interviña a imaxe con pintura, con escritos, reencadraba, repetía a imaxe de distinta maneira. Todo vale no xogo da memoria, o que lembramos agradábel un día ao seguinte xa non o é tanto, todo muda porque nós cambiamos continuamente. O inmobilismo é unha argumentación enganosa que só nos serve para iso, para enganarnos e crernos sempre os mesmos
E que é a viaxe? É un tránsito que nos percorre como unha corrente. Sempre viaxamos, de feito a historia da fotografía estivo ligada dende moi cedo ao fenómeno da viaxe. Os pioneiros percorreron Exipto e outros recónditos lugares coas súas pesadas cámaras para amosarlle ao noso civilizado e domesticado mundo como eran aqueles sitios salvaxes .
E dende iso até agora, en que cada vez se fan millóns de fotografías en viaxes que na meirande parte dos casos soamente se ven una vez.
Unha vez no Brasil impartira un obradoiro de fotografía e logo fixen unha viaxe con dous alumnos, João Castillo e Pedro David, grandes amigos e fotógrafos. A viaxe transcorría polo interior de Minas Gerais, dende a cidade de Diamantina até a capital do estado, Belo Horizonte. Eu estaba a traballar na serie A viaxe imprecisa que trataba dunha viaxe por distintos sitios do mundo (Cuba, Tailandia, Exipto, Brasil, Marrocos…) na que o fío conductor eran os xogos dos nenos. Con eles ocorreume algo ao que aínda lle ando a dar voltas, en realidade non deixa de ser unha anécdota graciosa e sen importancia ningunha, mais coido que detrás das cousas sinxelas atópanse as respostas máis importantes.
Son dos que cren que tendemos a complicalo todo e a dar explicacións grandilocuentes de cousas que se poderían explicar con apenas medio sorriso. Ben, cóntovos. Eu estaba a xogar ao fútbol cuns meniños ao tempo que lles tiraba fotos e mentres tanto eles preguntáranme de onde era. Eu díxenlles que de España, concretamente de Madrid, aínda que vivo en Barcelona. Entón saíu de qué equipo era e díxenlles que dende neno era do Real Madrid e comezaron a dicirme nomes de xogadores até que de súpeto dixeron “Salgado”. Nese intre os meus amigos saltaron enriba do neno e abraiados dixéronlle “coñeces a Salgado, a Sebastião Salgado”. O neno ollábaos con total incredulidade e eu reaccionei e díxenlles “non é o fotógrafo, é o lateral dereito do Real Madrid, Míchel Salgado”. Entón eran os meus amigos os que non entendían nada, a eles non lles interesaba o fútbol e non sabían quen era ese tal Míchel Salgado, en cambio estaban sorprendidos de que un meniño perdido nunha vila recóndita soubese da existencia do omnipresente fotógrafo brasileiro. Nese intre decateime de que eu mantiña un vínculo cun neno ao outro lado do Atlántico, mentres que a xente que vivía moi próxima non lle era posíbel estabelecelo. Haberá quen diga “que parvada”, “unha anécdota trivial qué ten de extraordinario”, seguramente é certo pero é que eles non viron a ollada de complicidade entre o neno e mais eu. Iso fíxome descubrir que por moi lonxe que esteamos da nosa casa, estamos máis preto de todo e de todos porque existen unha morea de interconexións ás que llamamos casualidades, por descoñecermos o seu funcionamiento, que nos unen. Por iso digo que mellor que viaxar por moitos sitios afastados é viaxar cara ao noso interior e se cadra precisamos viaxar moi lonxe para aprender.
“E isto que ten que ver coa fotografía?” dirán, pois a verdade é que talvez moito ou moi pouco, o único que sei é que para min constitúe algo indivisíbel, como algo innato e espontáneo, fotografo para procurar na miña memoria e lembro para fotografar e volver recordar outra vez, é simplemente un xogo tan trivial e sinxelo como o que xogamos neste mundo que nos confunde para logo darnos unha resposta que nos entristece, que nos alegra, que nos fai sentir únicos e asemade tan insignificantes e fráxiles.
Saben o que lles digo? Que me encantou contarlles as miñas cousas e que agardo que gocen coas fotografías.
Até sempre, José Ramón.
THE IMPOSSIBLE JOURNEY
During the time we live there is always a different vinculation with reality, ours and the one related to ourselves, everything can be summarised in the hackneyed phrase: nothing is what it looks like.
In spite of all this we love to store, to document our insecure lives as if that could buy us a piece of the immortality we search, and the worst that we find is, sometimes just an attractive void, a chilling sensation, but we still go on without asking ourselves many questions.
In the beginning photography interested me just as a way of documenting my journeys, but more as an interpretation of my own memory, I used it all the time, I did not take notes during the journey. I wanted to interpret the information once the journey was over, from a distance; that way I let my memory exercise and interpret with absolute freedom. Then I thought of the ambar which preserved the memory of our planet and experimented with polyester resin, and my images were covered with it. I did not respect any conventional photographic rule, so I intervened with paint, texts, I reframed, repeated the image in a different way. Everything is permitted in the memory game, things which one day are considered nice change the next day, everything changes because we constantly change. Immobilism is a deceptive argument which only makes us belive we are always the same.
And, what is the journey? It is something that goes through us like an electric current. We are always travelling, in fact the history of photography has always been linked to the journeys. The pioneers travelled through Egypt and other remote places carrying their heavy cameras in order to show our civilised and domestic world what those wild places were like.
And from then to nowadays, when millions of pictures are taken, pictures which people see, in most cases, just once.
After giving a workshop in Brazil I went on a journey with two of my students, Joâo Castillo and Pedro David, great friends and photographers. The journey was through Minas Gerais, from Diamantina to the capital Belo Horizonte. I was working then in A viaxe imprecisa, which was about a journey through different places in the world (Cuba, Thailand, Egypt, Brazil, Morocco…), a work whose thread was children’s games. Something happened when I was with them, something which I have given a lot of thought to, maybe just an amusing and insignificant anecdote, but I believe that the most important answers are to be found behind simple things. I tend to complicate everything, to give grandiloquent explanations when something can be explained with just a smile. Well, let me tell you about it. I was playing football with some kids while I took some pictures. They had asked me where I was from.
I told them I was from Spain, from Madrid though I lived in Barcelona. Then they asked me which football team was my favourite and I told them I had always been a supporter of the Real Madrid. They started to tell me names of players until suddenly they said “Salgado”. At that moment my friends jumped on the kid and told him in surprise “you’ve heard of Salgado, Sebastiâo Salgado”. The boy did not understand a thing so I said to my friends “it’s not the photographer, he means the player of the Real Madrid, Michel Salgado”. Now my friends did not understand anything, they did not like football and did not have the slightest idea of who Michel Salgado was. What had really baffled them was that a boy in a remote village had ever heard of the famous Brazilian photographer. It was then when I realized that there was a kind of connection between me and a boy from the other side of the Atlantic. Some people may say “what a silly story, what´s the point of this trivial anecdote?” they may be right, but they did not see the complicity look between us. It made me realize that no matter how far from home we are, we are closer to everything and to everybody, because there are a lot of interconnections that we can call coincidences since the way they function is unknown to us. That’s why I say that it is better to travel inward than to go to very distant places…
“And what does all this have to do with photography?” you may say. Well, the truth is that very little or perhaps very much, the only thing I know is that for me it is something indivisible, like something innate and spontaneous, I make photos just to search my memory and I remember in order to take pictures and remember again, it’s just a game as trivial and simple as the game we play in this world that confounds us and then gives us an answer that makes us feel sad, happy, unique and also so insignificant and fragile.
You know what? It’s really been a pleasure to tell you these things, and I hope you enjoy watching my photographs.
Bye. José Ramón.
cefvigo 