Water drops that captured my eyes
Short story when my passion to photograph water in all its forms started, like water drops that captured my eyes attention.
Late in 1955, my eyes peeped into the Blue planet, arriving at La Paz, city adjacent to the high Andes.
My love and passion to portray Water would start in the small town of Chulumani at Bolivian Sub-Tropics called Yungas, about 3 hours’ drive from La Paz.
My father would take me hunting partridges with his friends to “La Granja”, place not far from our summer house. Do understand that this farm belonged to a family who donated it to a congregation when we used to go. At a later date the military took control of it.
Summer is always rainy in this part of South América, or at least it was before the climate changes. I still remember the smell of a mixture of the tall grass from the surroundings bathed with water, as well as the wet clay of the slippery trail that we drove.
Low white clouds covered the near by hills and darker overcast clouds gave even light painting a dark green scenery.
I was young and wouldn’t be allowed to use a rifle, so would stay near the 4x4 jeeps parking area. My father had bought a large pair of binoculars that he would carry to search for the hunting game. While I could hear the distant sound of the gun shots, I would be scanning the surroundings with these binoculars.
The silver colored water droplets clinging to leaves and pine branches captured my attention. The retina would record this scene for the years to come. I tried to capture them using a Kodak pocket camera, placing it behind the binoculars, thinking that I could photograph what I was seeing.
Obviously, I got a black and white blurred image, and huge disappointment.
Twenty plus year would pass and it was only when I went to college, that I started chasing and portraying Water with reflex film cameras.
This photograph was taken returning to our summer house at Chulumani. The sun decided to paint the Water Drops that were left by a tropical storm, and the silver colored water drops are a close representation of my vision at “La Granja”, where my passion and interest on water started.
Note: The reddish tint of the leaves is a little exaggerated from the dark-red-brown real color. This color came out after a problem during development of the reversal film by the lab.
Data
Rollei 6006
Lens Sonnar 150mm + Sky filter
120 Kodak Ektachrome EPR 64 ASA film
At this date I did not register camera settings
GPS -16.410542, -67.532561
