Yailin Alfaro’s photography
seeks reality

Mireya Castañeda/ Photos courtesy of interviewee

Observing the world through a camera and capturing an image can be a challenging and exciting experience. Although some speak of luck, there is no doubt that good luck must coincide with the intentions of an artist and photos are imbued with the photographer’s thinking about life.

Comments about luck perhaps apply fundamentally to news photography, which must transmit an event, exactly as it unfolds, without prior planning or subsequent interventions.

These must be descriptive, objective photographs and the kind taken on a daily basis by the young photographer and designer Yailín Alfaro (Havana, 1983), who shares with our readers her point of view and interests in this art form that continues to evolve from its initial technical origins.

As yet unready to definitively cross the border toward purely artistic work, the young photographer has some plans in the works and has already completed several series around specific themes, including En attendant, exhibited in galleries in Cuba, Cyprus and Serbia. Her photos, in particular those related to culture, tourism and society, have been published in a number of Spanish and Italian newspapers and magazines.

A graduate of Cuba’s Advanced Institute of Design, she has been interested in photography since her days as a student and enrolled in courses offered by the Union of Cuban Writers and Artists and the Center for the Development of Visual Arts. Yailin responds to some question and comments from Granma International.

Design has clearly contributed to your vision of photography…

It has served me well, of course, since the composition of the image, the proportions, the placement of the subject within the format is very important, the shot angle, the cropping…

Yes, I began to work as a designer at the weekly Opciones and also as a news photographer which is distinct and specific. I loved the running against the clock after the news, getting the photos in.

It is my first photographic work with the National Ballet of Cuba and I exhibited it last year at the Center for the Development of Visual Arts. They are journalistic, since I am telling the story of what happens in the dressing rooms, the behavior of dancers behind the curtain, getting dressed, the nervousness, the assistant who helps.

But there is a notable difference. The ballet has a theater with curtains, dressing rooms, sets and the circus here has none of that, just the tent and a small space in the back for the artists. I worked for a year with the performers at the Trompoloco tent. I entitled the show Detrás del coreto, (Behind the tarp) which is the tent’s curtain. It was opened just prior to the 12th International Circus Festival, Circuba 2013. (July 16-21).

Yailín leans in this direction, with each image leaving the viewer with a particular vision of everyday scenes which symbolize different aspects of society. She already has several works in her portfolio, including those about Cuban women, which she describes saying, "Not the typical teacher or doctor. I’m looking farther afield, women in other complex occupations, shoemakers, repairing tires, a tile-setter, a barber. Always somewhat journalistically, since the women themselves explain why they work in these occupations."

I like press photography that should not be manipulated and that's how I do all my work. I may make a simple color correction, or of the grain if the ISO was very high and its grainy, lots of darkness, little light. Generally, I try not to manipulate.

As for photography, many insist, you have it or you don't. Here GI presents a few shots taken by Yailin Alfaro for her circus exposition. Perhaps readers will concur with this reporter that the young woman has a good eye, that as she says, "The photo says something, that it's real and that people see the moment precisely, exactly as it was."