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Table of Contents

Interview with Pia Parolin

The Longest Road

Love in the Time of Covid

A Day in DC

The Secret to Balinese Happiness

Street Shooters of February 2021

Love in the Time of Covid

Luis Gerardo González Bruzual

Summarizing the Covid-19 pandemic with just eight photos is very difficult, especially in a city where there is no gasoline, water, gas, not even money to buy everyday products or pay for public transportation. I’m referring to the city of Porlamar, Isla Margarita, where shooting the streets is no easy task because people are aggressive and get upset when they see that their photo has been taken. You have to use your cunning, try to go unnoticed, use discreet cameras, like my little Nikon 1-J1, which I hide on my person in order to make the images as real as possible. In the top photo that I titled “Mother’s Love,” we see an exhausted young woman who has collapsed with her two children and fallen asleep in the middle of the street because of the stress and fatigue of the pandemic.

I keep walking under an inclement sun, making my situation harder, unpleasant. I mingle with people. Some of them ward off the Chinese virus with their masks, while at the same time shielding themselves from the burning rays of our king star with an umbrella, reminding me of the story of “The Umbrella Man” by an English writer of Norwegian descent, Roald Dahl.

Protection from Covid and the Sun

Now I see the street differently, it has transformed into a new world where I see the elderly pushing grocery carts around, containing a few belongings and their “loved ones.” It’s become commonplace to see grocery carts on the streets of the city, but now they are used to transport just about everything except food. They immediately bring the food shortage to mind, a crisis that is causing much suffering here, especially for children and the elderly, many of whom have died from malnutrition.

  • With my dear friends, until the end.
  • My God, how long will this go on?

Other people on the streets work preparing and selling food. In their gaze, I see a plea for us to buy their goods and while this seller lets me take his photograph, another passerby gives me a strange look, wondering what I’m doing. His gaze is a mixture of surprises, it is an accurate reflection of hunger and the hardships that Venezuelans are going through, and not only because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

  • Please buy something from me.
  • And what are you doing?

As I come around a corner, like a premonition, I find a large sign next to the symbol of peace painted on the garage door of an automotive workshop that says, “Live and let live.” At that very moment, I see an old woman walks slowly in front of the sign, her head hanging as if she were tired of the pandemic situation, leading me to think that the title for this photograph should be: “Covid, leave us alone”.

“Covid, leave us alone.”

After almost two hours, walking and mingling with people, a religious woman in a mask appeared. The nun immediately reminds me of a famous saying attributed to God: “Take care of yourself, and I will take care of you”.

“Take care of yourself, and I will take care of you.”

I look at my watch and two hours have now elapsed amongst the crowd, in the heart of the city of Porlamar on Margarita Island, in that chaotic place that I have come to call The Underworld because of what I’ve seen. In a now reflexive act, I clean my hands with alcohol and think once again: Why do I take a chance at 66 years old, an age when, if I happen to get the virus, it would be very difficult for me to survive, more so in a country where medical services are lacking and medicines to treat such conditions are practically impossible to get?

As I drive back to my house, my mind keeps reviewing the day’s images like in a movie and again I wonder not just why I take the risk, but if I would do it again.

Immediately, I know the answer is YES because God made photographers to document this kind of event and its effects on our societies so that the world never forgets them.

Luis Gerardo González Bruzual

Luis has worked in regional and national media in Cumaná for 25 years, studying biology at the Universidad de Oriente 2, Sucre, in 1982. Later in 1989, he studied at the School of Social Communication of the Central University of Venezuela 3, where he obtained a degree in Social Communication. In audiovisual classes, he met Carlos Herrera, a professor of photography, who led him definitively to this profession. He later returned to his native Cumaná in the province of Sucre in Venezuela’s interior, where for many years he dedicated himself to photography. His photographic work centered on Contemporary Dance in Venezuela, documenting the beginnings of this challenging discipline. In Venezuela, he presented more than 30 solo exhibitions and has also participated in group shows in Peru, Spain and Miami. His journalistic photographic work, including a study of birds, was a key contribution in the creation of the first book in the Venezuela Photographic Guide series about ornithology on Margarita Island. He has illustrated more than 60 publications in international specialized journals of ornithology including The Journal of Caribean Ornithology, The Wilson Bulleting, The AUK from USA, The Biologist Peru, Cotinga Magazine from England, 9 Magazine from Venezuelan Ornithology OVUM, Saber Magazine of the UDO, and Luz Magazine of the University of Zulia. In the field of communication, his images have been used in a total of 12 books by Venezuelan and foreign authors, as well as in multiple magazines, brochures, and newspapers, such as El Nacional, El Universal, Diario de Caracas, El Mundo, Últimas Noticias, 2001, Diario de Oriente, 21st Century, Oriente Weekly, etc.

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Articles
February 2021

Interview with Pia Parolin

The Longest Road

Nicolas St-Pierre gets his kicks on Ottawa Road 31

Love in the Time of Covid

Photographers were made for times like these.

A Day in DC

This was a chance to document something historic.

The Secret to Balinese Happiness

Meet some of the happiest people on earth.

Street Shooters of February 2021

Top contributions from members of our community.

Street Photography Magazine is the journal of street and documentary photography

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