It’s been a long while, since I made any serious effort at portraiture. Almost a decade in fact as the last time was in Bhutan in 2016. Quite a shock really, but that is partly due to two lost years during covid stretching out the gap. The rest of the time is entirely my own doing - I sometimes have no space in my yearly calendar from running workshops and tours to do anything else, except come home for a much needed break.
This past May, I spent three days with my friends Sabine and Alberto driving from one estancia to another with an appointment to photograph a gaucho at each location. Sabine had organised that we would visit two gauchos per day, and this worked out very well for me.
I normally prefer to roam and pick the people I find photogenic, but this was not possible on this occasion because Sabine didn’t know what sort of subjects I was looking for, and also, she contacted all the gauchos she knows from her time as a guide in Torres del Paine national park.
The setup was very nice. Each gaucho invited us in, we would sit for a few hours chatting about life and things, and it always felt very relaxed and comfortable. Alberto is a driver for the national parks but also worked as a gaucho for a spell, so he knew most of the gauchos that we visited or at least had some common ground / colleagues with them. Alberto is very good at talking, and that made up for me not being able to speak Spanish.
Sabine and Alberto would tell the gauchos what I was looking for, or explain that I would just make some photos, and to kind of ignore me.
I must say that I have had the belief that most of my portraiture work is non-verbal. You can convey so much with your own expressions and how you approach someone, but I was rusty and very much feeling a bit of out my depth on this occasion. Lots of pauses where the subjects didn’t know what I was doing, and I didn’t know either. I tend to know what I like when I see it, but I’m often waiting for folks to do something that I like, rather than me orchestrate them.
Daniel was the last gaucho we visited. He was expecting his first son to be born the day after our visit, and seemed pretty relaxed about it all.
Anyway, I really love making pictures of people. I wish I could do it more often. It is a welcome reprieve from doing landscape work all the time.
You’d think that doing what you love couldn’t become tiring, but the truth is that everyone needs a break away from what they love. It allows you to recharge, get perspective, and to return to it (landscape photography in my case) with a renewed sense of wonder.
I can’t encourage anyone more to ‘take a break, and do something else’ away from their passion. It really does help.