Héctor Ges: My Passion for Analogue Photography

Héctor Ges is a photographer and art director from Barcelona. In this interview, he shares his thoughts as well as some photos of his road trip to Navarra, Spain.

Hello Héctor - Welcome to the Lomography Magazine. Could you introduce yourself to our readers?

What's up guys, I'm Hector Ges, photographer born in Barcelona and located on Planet Earth in general.

I'm 28 years old and I have been part of the photography world for 5 years. I am also having a shot at being a writer, I write notes under my Instagram photos, I am an animal lover and crazy about road trips. I think that's pretty much everything.

When did you discover analogue photography?

I'm not gonna lie. I have been shooting digital for 5 years and I only started shooting analogue two months ago!

My dad gave me his analogue Pentax P30N and one day I decided to buy some film and try it out, to see what this kind of photography made me feel. And now I can say that I have fallen in love with this art form that has so much to explain in only one photo.

Why choose analogue photography in this day and age, which is ever more digital?

Since I took my first roll of film to be developed, living the feeling of waiting for the photos, of sitting in my house and observing them, was something that moved me and got me hooked since the first minute.

I can say that thanks to analogue photography, my photos breathe stories where I can find inspiration to write, and that's something that digital photography has never given me. It is more of a friend, more real, more inspirational, and in my opinion, it expresses what I want to transmit to the spectator much better.

Shooting with a roll of film with only 35 shots makes me think more about each and every photo I take, it forces me to be more original in each one, because for me it would be unthinkable to repeat two photos on the same roll of film. This doesn't tend to happen with digital, because your SD card allows you to take hundreds of photos and then choose the right one, and that gives you a freedom that ends up turning into a lack of worry about the final work.

Which of the 10 Golden Rules of Lomography do you apply in your daily life?

Each and every one of them represents me very much in my day-to-day with my camera, but I could say that there are two that, if I didn't follow every single day, it would make me feel like a different person.

The first is to go everywhere with my camera. I can even tell you that when I go to a party I take it (you never know what is going to happen when humans turn into animals).

The second is not to follow the rules. I couldn't say why, but analogue makes me feel much wilder, above all on my road trips with friends. You feel more carefree about your equipment (to a certain extent) because they are older cameras but are like war tanks, and that creates a sense of overflowing the limits of rules established by photography studios.

In those moments when I am with my friends, I forget about taking straight photos, of scoring top marks for exposure, of making people look good, of everything. I simply observe and shoot. Simple, don't you think?

Tell us about your road trip to Navarra

Mi partner-in-adventures Victor Supertramp and I got a gig for a rucksack brand. We were thinking about how to shoot this project, and where to go (Barcelona does offer a lot of options). But the next day, we woke up with an idea. And what if we got on a car and drove to the desert in Navarra?

I immediately got on the phone with two friends, they're the girls that appear in the photos, I asked them if they were free, and in a matter of hours, we were en route to Lleida. We spent the first night there, in a small village next to the town, where Victor has a house. And the next day, we woke up super early and drove in the direction of the desert.

What can I say about this place, the photos speak for themselves. They inspire a freedom of action that few places can offer, and on top of that it looks as if you were in America. We spent the whole day there, discovering places, having fun, fooling around and enjoying what an open space and a camera have got to offer.

The next day, I woke up yearning for more, to go somewhere else completely different, so we drove to the Pirineos mountains. We went from this dry place to these snowy mountains with a beauty that, honestly, I cannot describe with words.

There, sitting on a tree trunk in front of those mountains, we realized that it was like this, and in no other way, that we wanted to live. Neither the money, the resources, nor anything at all mattered, we only need a strong friendship, the same will of going on an adventure and getting lost in a dreamlike location.

How do you choose your subject? - or is it the subject that chooses you?

I go on the personalities of each person that is portrayed in my photos. I never force on a personality that doesn't belong with a person.

I have read a lot about psychology, about how to understand people and how to read between the lines, to be able to make someone feel as comfortable as possible in front of your camera. So I simply let them decide themselves what it is they want to express in each of my shots.

Let's say Naturalness.

What do you think about the current photography scene in Spain?

To be honest, I see that art is becoming more and more about numbers and popularity. It's great to have a family on the web who supports you, who values you for who you are and the way you are, but what I can see today is this group of people who are devoting themselves to making what other people want to see and who don't create what their heart needs.

In summary, more art and fewer numbers.

And the most important question - favourite color?

Ochre, the shade of the sand.

Follow Héctor's analogue adventures on Instagram.

written by rafaelcabral on 2017-12-10 #people #places #roadtrip #navarra