Finding an unscanned film from a few months ago is nothing compared to great photographers finding amazing images from decades ago. But for me who likes to develop at home as soon as possible after finishing a roll (or two), it seems like a great discovery, a reward for my mess.
I always had dreams and ambitions of being a great photographer, like a short bearded heavy metal loving and badass motorcycle hooligan Aussie version of Henri Cartier-Bresson. Yep, I’ve always had tickets on myself. I figured that slinging an old camera around my neck and loading it with some classy film would automatically turn me into Magnum material. Well not really. I realised very early on in my photographic journey that I like owning shoes, eating food, sleeping in a bed and living in a house.
The background to this story is that I bought an Olympus OM20 when they came out back in 1983, together with the 50mm kit lens. Over the next few years I added a Tokina 28mm and then an 80-200mm zoom. This gear served me well over many years, but about 2002, when small and light digital P&S cameras became affordable, they seemed much more practical. So I got one and the OM20 got used less and less, eventually being consigned to the back of a drawer.
On November 7, 1964 Conxita and Josep got married. You will see that, according to the typical professional studio photo of that time, they made a good couple and, of course, they continue to do so.
At that time I did not know them. It was in 1973 when I started working as an Engineer in the company where Josep had been Head of Workshop for years. We shared the stage for more than 25 years and except for minor work discrepancies, the relationship was good. Sometimes we told each other family anecdotes and this is how I learned about his wife Conxita, his son Albert, his parents and their hometown of Artesa de Segre (Lleida) – a place I had visited on several occasions.
“Are you shooting film in there?” my uncle Anthony asked me on the boardwalk of Seaside Heights, AKA “The Jersey Shore.” A valid question in this day and age. Digital cameras are looking more like film cameras–like my own Fujifilm X-E4–but it wasn’t the X Series slung on my arm that day, it was my Minolta SRT 100 with a Rokkor 58mm 1.4 lens and a Vivitar 28mm Auto Wide-Angle lens close by. Loaded inside was Kodak ColorPlus 200, a chameleon of films, appearing under many iterations since its debut in 1972.
