As I walked aimlessly around the vast Piazza di San Pietro looking for something that could entice my eye in the early March afternoon, out of the corner of my eye I sensed this priest having lunch whilst hunching over a magazine. It was not so much a full-on view of him as it was a feeling, for I did not want to make myself so evident as to scare my prey.
The image that came immediately to my mind had already been taken sometime in the past, many years ago. It was something out of Cartier-Bresson's Leica or W Eugene Smith's Rolleiflex, one of the two. Both equally eager in their pursuit of light and shadow to send a message through their truthful negatives. And so I went to it like a dog to a bone. Only to find that I had no more frames left in my camera.
I accepted my fate and sat without haste behind the huge column to load my film again. Being the eternal pessimist I felt that my luck being what it had always been, would fail me and that my subject would have fled the scene before I had a chance to photograph him.
I stood up and looked around again and much to my surprise he was still there finishing his sandwich. I crouched down to my knees (acúsome, padre, que he pecado...) and bang, one, two, three frames.
This one here is the one I find to be the best of the three. The one that pays homage to my photographer heroes. The one that makes the entire journey worth the sleepless nights. The shot.
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