Team Loupe: Álvaro Martínez García

HF: It’s interesting you say that your approach to the medium is a result of your doubts as a photographer. Some of the processes you’ve used are technically advanced, and to me they seem fitting, in the way they expand the projects themes beyond your grandfather’s story. The iPhone screenshots from your parents wedding point to how the family archive has changed, and removing your grandfather from images seems to re-interpret and disrupt the narrative of personal photo albums. Do you plan to take more pictures before the final production of the work, or will your focus be on other novel ways of interacting with archive material?

AMG: We are reshaping family archives. There are not so many images of me as a kid, because my parents gradually stopped taking pictures, whereas nowadays every single moment is documented and shared, because of the convenience of phone cameras permanently next to us. The current approach makes today’s archive vastly more numerous, but I am wary of the engagement with it, and of its preservation. I can’t imagine my grandson flicking through images of my youth in front of a screen with the same curiosity I looked at the boxes of images from my ancestors.
A lot of these “alternative” photographic responses you mention are accidental outcomes, second attempts I fiddled with after realising that a conventional “then/now” juxtaposition didn’t appeal to me. I was stubbornly looking for quality in my work, when really a project of this context needs to prioritise the truthfulness of the authorship over stylistic concerns.
I still see this project evolving, since it’s a subject that is inherent to my personal life. However, at the moment the intention is to work with the materials I have produced already, figuring out different potential outputs for them.

HF: On that note, how do you see the project ending up? As a book, or can we expect something else?

I am always curious of how it would look in book form, but I’m also interested in exploring different avenues. I would like it to be tangible and interactive, so the work doesn’t feel chronological, I want the  archive and the new work to merge into the same thing. Other than that, I hope for part of the project to be developed as an installation, and I have also recently shared an online selection of images on my website.
HF: You’ve talked about growing up with stories of your grandfather, stories that led to you idolising him. I’m interested in that idea of choosing our heroes more wisely, celebrating people closer to home rather than devoting our attention to celebrity scandals. Can you share a story about your grandfather here?

AMG: I have admired his capacity to enjoy, to turn the banal moments into something thrilling. He could be a cheeky man, but he also had very strong values, the two following stories illustrate this quirky personality.
He was the father of 3 girls – including my mother – and he would take them and his nieces to the horse races. According to my mum, he would lead the way towards the entrance of the box office, trailed by the group of kids. Then, he would open his blazer to the ticketer, pretending he had a badge from the army, when he was actually an employee of the steel industry. He had the confidence and appearance of a man in an official position, so he would get everybody to the races for free!
I also knew he had briefly been a member of the City Council of Gijón (a town in my region, Asturias), but I didn’t have much more knowledge about it. I visited the Municipal Archive to read the reviews of the City Council Sessions from the time. In one of those sessions, he intervened and recriminated that the Mayor and some other counselors had used the official vehicles for personal use in several occasions. After a few weeks, the board decided to lay Fermín off from his job, under the pretence of having used the official car to attend a football game. My mother wasn’t aware of this story, but from what I know of my grandfather, he did not like football.
Coming across interesting stories where a relative was involved is a priceless feeling. There will always be praise for public figures, I too am guilty of that, but I think there should be more interest in family history. We all have unique stories behind us, stories that can only be unleashed through our own curiosity. These kind of actions enhance, at least in my case, connections to our past.

HF: To end on a daunting question, you’ll be graduating soon, what are your plans for the years that follow?

In the short term, I would like to submit my work to different competitions, and prepare an installation setup for a show that some of my MA fellows are planning.
I need to navigate the photography industry, find out sustainable ways of combining personal work with a more stable job. I’m considering going back to a newsroom, and gaining some more journalistic experience, as I feel comfortable with writing.
www.alvaromartinezgarcia.com
Alvaro will be sharing more of his work over on our Instagram, where we feature new work every week.