Graphic Vision in the Streets: Creative Mobile Photography
Cara Gallardo Weil
“I like to shoot with my iPhone as it gives me the ability to be spontaneous, work discreetly and catch moments of life without being obtrusive. Having access to different apps opens up many creative possibilities—one can push an image to the limit or keep it simple."
—Cara Gallardo Weil
When I first discovered Cara Gallardo Weil's street photographs, I felt as though I had travelled the world with her. Viewing the heady flow of imagery, harnessing the excesses, exuberance, noise and pollution she has experienced on her travels allowed me to experience life through her eyes; her images evoked a sense of being part of her world, not a passive observer.
Her images bear out an instinctive approach, whether shot in colour or black and white and register with a heavily graphic-based lead. The thirty years she spent in the design industry working with such acclaimed photographers as Nick Knight and Anton Corbijn heavily influences her pictures. With a raw yet poetic vision, Gallardo Weil's photographs involve shapes, patterns, lines and topography with an abundance of unusual characters and interesting juxtapositions thrown into the mix.
Gallardo Weil works in the space between documentary and pure street photography: she captures her subjects in relation to their surroundings but also seeks to tell a legible story. It is this ambiguity that fuels her passion. Inspired by one of her idols, the great Henri Cartier-Bresson, Gallardo Weil is both a distant observer and a careful yet humble participant. As Cartier-Bresson himself said, "A photographer must always work with the greatest respect for his subject and in terms of his own point of view."
Gallardo Weil recognises the responsibility that street photographers have in documenting society, communities, neighbourhoods and lives. Her images do not reflect herself; rather they reflect life as it is being lived, a small part of the visual legacy of our times.
Gallardo Weil pushes the boundaries of mobile street photography, always lured by the promise of another picture. She is a photographer who will soon be on her way to another country, another shoot, another day.
—Joanne Carter
Editor's Note: Joanne Carter is the Founder and Editorial Director of TheAppWhisperer.com and a contributing editor for LensCulture.
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