266 Image-Content of the Day 2018/11/16 of-by patrick wey https://blog.patrickwey.com/category/image-content-of-the-day
The main zocalo square in Mexico City. You can see the historic cathedral in the background where Pope John visited and in fact i managed to photograph him as he passed by in his open vehicle carriage along with shots of the event itself, the people, the frenzy, in that following year. There was always a crazy number of volks-wagon bugs on the smog scented tar of the city streets. I felt quite comfortable in the excitement of the noice and architecture, painted in sounds of spanish floating about. I was young, full of adventure and inquisitive about everything. I carried camera gear wherever i went and felt obligated to document anything i could. I am not sure why, some passion rising up from the heart into the brain and once the mind caught a glimpse of what it could do, i was hooked, had to capture every move this world made. Nothing stood in my way, i would have gone anywhere. I tried to get work for Vogue, Time, National Geographic and would have gotten work for Vogue if i had stayed in Mexico, even National Geographic liked my portfolio especially shots i got of a staging of the crucifixion of Jesus in some little out of the way mountain town later on that year. Definitely there were opportunities in Mexico that i would never have gotten in NYC and believe me, because i tried. The competition was staggering and it is even worse today, i am sure.
I traveled in and out of the neighbourhoods of the city, across the land, the desert, the coast and fell in love with that spanish tainted country. I got a job teaching english downtown in a large institution and smelt the aroma of the cities air for a year.
I married a señorita, not for marriage but to get her into canada, though i thought we’d make a good couple i never conformed to the institution for any confirmation for anything. I don’t need some institution to determine whether i am married or not. I adopted the anti-establishment with a firm understanding of its hypocrisy years before and i wasn’t about to change my stance then or now, for the most part. Rosa is still a close friend and lives in canada but we dismantled the bed years ago.
It takes a certain talent to be a good street photographer, these were my early years, testing the tension of the people on the streets, seeing what i could do, building my love for the many faceted aspects of becoming a photographer, a label, an artist possibly, a writer maybe. That was then.
Image circa 76 or 77