62-0456_FRD-025-15-NYC
The term artist can apply to so many professions: painting, music, graphics, and even makeup. I personally think that only a few in any profession or avocation deserve to be called artists, and even fewer who really stand out from the rest.
I consider myself extremely fortunate not only to listen to and experience the music of Aterciopelados, a band that does stand out from the rest, but also to be friends with them.
I met Andrea and Hector while they were recording their album “Caribe Atomico” in Greenwich Village in New York City, and my first impression was like ‘cool, rock stars from Colombia’. An hour later the recording session started and Andrea started singing, and I was mesmerized, transported. To quote another great artist, Marilyn Monroe, “I was goose pimply all over”. I became an immediate groupie and hung out with the band for a few days, when Andrea asked me if I would consider photographing them for the album. I was elated and said yes.
We dedicated a few hours to a shoot, mostly location photographs around the East Village. It was spontaneous without a pre-determined concept. I loved working with them and I think I shot about 300 pictures outdoors and then we came back into the recording studio to wrap it all up when I thought to take a few close-ups of them together. This photograph comes from a series where Hector had taken his shirt off and I photographed it alone at different angles, then rewound the film in the camera and re-shot it of them, without any prior knowledge of what the superimposition would create.
With Andrea’s and Hector’s beautiful features, almost all of the double exposures yielded amazing results, but this one was one of my favorites as wonderful waves of sound and patterns emanate from Andrea’s lips while the light caught Hector’s eyes in such a way that they pierce right through the image.
I stay in touch with these great friends, and great artists, and never miss an opportunity to attend their concerts if I happen to be in the same city where they are performing. I often shrug when someone calls me an artist, when I think of all the people who consider themselves artists. But if Andrea and Hector are artists, then I too aspire to be one.
New York City, Summer 1998
