Mexico City, Again
A Photoessay
After seven years of graduate school, first in London and then at Harvard, I finally came back to Mexico City, my hometown. During the summer months, with the generous support of a DRCLAS summer grant, I was doing research toward my dissertation on the history of Our Lady of Remedios, a cult image considered patroness of the Spanish conquest over the Mexica. I was also been able to spend a good deal of time taking pictures of this amazing, yet crazy metropolis.
This has been a new experience, because instead of merely walking the streets, I have been forced to think what the city means to me. Thus, for this photographic project, I decided to show a crowded city where art is all over the place, where the big—and shameful—contrast between poverty and richness is impossible to miss, where some peaceful sites are still available … a modern city that breathes its past within. I made pictures mainly of architecture to show how people interact with it, but also paid attention to some aspects of urban infrastructure. I did make portraits of favorites places and sites that have been forgotten, the archive where I do my research, and some of many churches that show the passing of time. More than a full registry of Mexico City, this is the gaze over my reunion with it.
Spring | Summer 2010, Volume IX, Number 2
Rosario Inés Granados Salinas is a PhD candidate in Harvard’s Department of History of Art and Architecture.
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