Last summer we traveled to New York. I thought, “Summer! New York! Coney Island!” I had a photo of Bruce Gilden stuck in my head. But it couldn’t happen; there wasn’t a single day without rain… and we went back home, back to the routine. Within the repetitive, unglamorous activities, unlike past water travels, were the Barcelona Photobloggers activities, among them, giving a black‑and‑white lab course; tidying the house and asking myself what to do with expired black‑and‑white rolls; going to work, going to the beach…
I suppose at some point we can even have an idea… I grabbed the Pentax K1000 with the 50 mm and an Ilford 125 that had been forgotten for years and went to the beach to sunbathe.
The important thing was the sun, enjoying the breeze, the sea, and if I saw something, to shoot. I chose an old camera so I wouldn’t have to worry about anything, not the sand, not the thefts, and I thought that with an old camera no one would take me seriously and I could approach people without drawing attention.
I could have chased the geeks, the natural inhabitants of San Sebastián, but I preferred to look for my “companions,” the normal people who were going to enjoy the sun.
When the expired rolls ran out, I finished the series with my digital reflex and kept going unnoticed; I suppose I must have understood some summer code or that in Barceloneta there aren’t many prejudices. You can see the rest of the photos, almost unedited, on my photoblog.
Originally published on the PHEspaña SanDisk Blog