An experiment with expired film

[TIL #18] And a few pages from a photography workshop by Graciela Iturbide

Shooting expired film is a nearly religious discipline to some; to me, it was an accident: i found three rolls of colour medium-format film in a drawer, i noticed that they were way past the validity date and decided that i would follow the brand’s slogan “don’t think just shoot.” — and just this time, i won’t write anything and simply show a few images.

Photos: Lisboa, December 2023, January 2024

• camera: Lomography Lubitel 166 (as it is a simple plastic box, i used an app to measure the light)

• film: Lomography 100 (expired)

• processed by: Máquinas de Outros Tempos (o Porto)

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Tales of Ink and Light are short stories and poems told with words (the ink) and photographs (the light). Every other week, I share a photograph and the story behind it, as well as brief thoughts on photography and the creative process.

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The open book of the moment

In my apartment, i use a couple of small easels to keep photobooks open for a few days or occasionally a few weeks. It is a way to engage into a longer dialogue with some of the images. And at the moment, one of the open books is …

Aperture’s series of photography workshops turned into a book format gives the reader the opportunity to see images made by an accomplished artist over the course of their career while reading the artist’s own explanation of their work and their evolution. One of my main takeaways from Mexican photographer Graciela Iturbide is the following passage:

Photography helps me, above all, to see: it forces me to pay more attention to details whenever I am busy following the action. Mexico City — whose streets I continue to explore on foot — has shown me that the ordinary is the real source of the extraordinary. Street photography reveals to me how marvels are concealed within the commonplace. Of course, I'm predisposed to think this way, having had the good fortune to be born Mexican, to belong to a country where the legends of pre-Hispanic cultures still pervade our daily lives. Capturing the symbolism and meaning-the poetic dimension of humankind-is what most interests me, rather than exercises in photographic style.

(p. 20, emphasis mine)

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Thank you for reading the Tales of Ink and Light. I’ll see you soon.