My earliest memory of photography is taking pictures of my family on my grandmother’s birthday. I remember holding the first camera the family owned in my hands. My father got the camera, and I started playing.
When I was twelve I was in my house and there was a snowstorm. Across the street there was a man carrying wood in a little cart and he fell, and stayed down. He may have been drinking. I went outside and took a picture of him. I think I remember it because it was a moment when I was documenting something, not just taking pictures of my family. I also remember I was frightened of confronting a person with a camera, but I couldn’t stop myself.
Starting out, I was working for a very poor newspaper, so I was the only photographer there on the weekend, covering everything. The director would give me one roll of film a day to shoot four, five or six assignments. That was a great lesson, because I had to be super tight.
I don’t have a favourite picture. I have a lot of pictures that I like, but I would like to say my favourite would be the one I’m going to shoot tomorrow.
I was very moved after covering the earthquake in Haiti. I was one of the first journalists from Reuters to arrive, and I was there for about 45 days. It was long and tough. You can see human beings at their most basic instinct for survival.
It was a very weird feeling in Haiti because I know I was there doing my job, and I would like to feel that our job means something for people, but at the same time I felt powerless. What do you say when a kid comes to you and asks you for water and food, and you have nothing but a camera? I couldn’t answer that question, and I felt frustrated that I couldn’t do anything.
I want to shoot pictures that can reach everybody, from my mother, to the president of a country, to a CEO, to an artist. I try to make my photography as simple and direct as possible.
I consider myself a fisherman or a hunter. When I’m a hunter I have a specific thing that I have to photograph. But sometimes I change to a fisherman and I don’t know what’s going to come, I’m not expecting anything in particular.
