A Brief Encapsulated History

    In 1958, after a failed attempt to study engineering, I started my career as a freelance photographer in Santiago, photographing weddings, birthdays, families, advertising, public relations, theater groups, etc. My first journalistic works, in 1960, were for "La Voz", a weekly of the Archbishopric of Santiago.

      Shortly afterwards, the "South Pacific Mail" of Santiago, a weekly in English and where I also started writing, was added. Then came some the main journals of the time: Ercilla, Vea (See,) Siete días (Seven Days,) El diario ilustrado (The Illustrated Dialy,) Zig-Zag, Paula, etc. And soon foreign publications were added, such as The Houston Post, Time, Life, Super Mundo Deportivo (Super Sports World,) Clarín de Buenos Aires and others.

      In 1962, while covering for La Voz the OAS Foreign Ministers Conference in Punta del Este, Uruguay, I met Mario Planet, one of the greats of Chilean journalism and my "mentor", and the ineffable Teddy Córdova, another of the greats. Both were key pieces in my transition to international journalism and photography. The conference turned out to be a true university course on how international politics works (or "international shenanigans,” if you like). In addition to being my first foray abroad, it also helped me to establish myself firmly as a photographer. I carried a portable lab which I installed in the bathroom of my hotel room, much to the consternation of my roommate. Every night I developed the film taken during the day, and the next morning I sold them to the journalists covering the conference.

      To my surprise and happiness, I sold everything I printed.

      In July of that same year I covered the 1962 Soccer World Cup, which was held in Chile, both for "La Voz" and for "Super Sports World", of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Then, in September, I covered a military uprising in Buenos Aires. An army faction rose against the "constitutional" government of José María Guido (who had succeeded Arturo Frondizi, overthrown by Juan Carlos Onganía, the "protector" of Guido). That was my first experience as a "war correspondent" and defined my attitude towards the military forever.

      On my return to Santiago I sold all the material obtained in Buenos Aires to the Chilean press. Shortly thereafter I started teaching photography and journalism in English at the School of Journalism of the University of Chile and I started as a photographer in the press department (directed by Douglas Hübner) of the TV Channel 9 of the University of Chile where we used still photos to cover some of the news. On Channel 9 I was also in charge of international news, thanks mainly to my knowledge of English.

      My relationship with Mario Planet also included taking photographs for TIME Inc., of which Mario was a stringer. Also, every time a journalist or representative of TIME arrived in Chile, Mario took advantage of my English and put me as a visitor's guide. That led to finally, in 1967, being invited to New York by Life Domestic editor Roy Rowan to come to New York to receive training as a correspondent. I was placed with Life en Español and my duties there were translating text into Spanish and attending meetings with the staff of Life Domestic. The Big Apple totally captivated me and when, after five months, I returned to Santiago I did it with the conviction, almost unconscious, that I was going to have to return definitively, something that happened in October 1968, when I came back to cover the election of Nixon for Channel 9 and the Eventus Press Agency of Santiago, which I had founded with some photographer and journalist friends.

      Already established in New York, on my own, because Life en Español was closing and my relationship with them was based on my presence and permanence in Santiago, something that no longer interested me, I actively sought to position myself as a freelance photographer. For a while I was represented by Liaison (later Gama-Liaison) and then Echave & Associates. Through these agencies my works were published in Newsweek, Oui, Manchete, Spiegel and other publications. I also did more commercial work, which took me to Morocco (twice), Puerto Rico and Mexico among other countries. I also did work for human rights organizations, which took me to Nicaragua in Central America. And there was no lack of personal projects, for which I traveled to Europe, the Caribbean and, again, Central America.

      In New York, the city itself, my family, my friends and acquaintances were, and are, a constant source of inspiration and a kind of permanent subject. I am fascinated by the relationship between people and the interaction of human beings with their environment. The passing of the years has produced an enormous accumulation of images, a fact that by itself has made them acquire an historical value. After all, my first serious photographic attempts date back to the early 1950s, more than 60 years ago, a figure that simply sounds incredible.

      That same passing of the years, plus other factors, damaged my cardiovascular system and on July 4, 1999 I landed in the emergency room of Saint Luke's Hospital with chest pains and before I fully realized what was happening to me, they did a triple bypass. Nothing better than "a close encounter of the third kind” with our mortality to make us think and ask what are, perhaps, the most basic questions.

      These experiences that, it goes without saying, are new to me, have given a new life to those more than one hundred thousand images that represent my life work and, the closest thing to happiness that has happened in my life (except for my family, all things considered.)

      Now, my most fervent desire is to have the time to explore and share them.

      The rest, my friends, is another story ...

Marcelo Montealegre.