When my pioneer wife Rosemary told me that we were moving
from Mexico City in 1975 to Canada (the US was out as I was an alien Argentine)
I followed orders. She further informed me that I would have a hard time
learning French so Montreal was out and that I would not be able to handle the
Toronto snow. So we came to Vancouver.
It is my belief that if the French CBC had not hired me to
take station ID slides for their TV
station launch and I had not met Malcolm Parry I would still be washing cars
for car rental agencies. I sometimes wonder what would have happened if we
had originally settled in Toronto with the proximity of New York as a place for
an enemy Argentine alien to seek photographic work.
One very good Vancouver photographer, Brent Daniels, did just
that and moved to Toronto. But before he left he gave me this beautifully odd
Hollywood scoop light which I still have.
In my years of having a big studio I did a lot of
experimenting to keep me active when work might have been slow. I had a
favourite subject Jo-Ann who would visit me for sessions, once a month on
Thursdays.
She was very plástica, a word of choice for my friend Argentine
artist Juan Manuel Sánchez who for 10 years was my mentor (without me knowing).
By plástica he meant a combination of flexibility, muscle tone with a touch of
voluptuousness. Jo-Ann talked little and
most of my instructions were with a nod of my head and she would always seem to
know what to do.
Since these sessions were not magazine assignments I did not
have to produce on deadline a useable image for a demanding art director. Here I
could afford to do as I pleased. But in all instances I liked (and still like)
to choose a theme or one lighting setup. I suggested to Jo-Ann that we would
use the scoop light and nothing more.
I have no idea what a magazine art director would have said
of these pictures. But I do know that they led me to further experimentation
with the idea of simple themes where the restrictive parameters made me more
alert to look for that shot.