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Contemplations           TARA YAP

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28 July 2008 (Monday)

Bagyo Frank: Sa Litrato

I had no story to tell. When Typhoon Frank battered my Iloilo and the rest of Panay that fateful Saturday, I was in a hospital bed. Suffice to say, I missed out on the biggest and most important (so far) coverage in my hometown. For someone who breathes the air of adrenaline-pumping adventure, I felt defeated. It was as if I let history passed by.

To be honest, I couldn’t wait to get out of the hospital. This whole thing has to be recorded, I thought. While I knew that thousands also did the same with their very own digital cameras or camera phones, I still had the inkling of going out and doing what I’m supposed to be doing—that is, freezing moments that can transcend the test of time.

When I was finally discharged from the hospital the following Monday, I went out to record the horrendous aftermath that literally took us by surprise. Armed with my camera and against doctor’s orders that I should rest, I scoured along Jaro district and clicked the shutter button of my camera. For the next three weeks or more, my photography rendezvous concentrated on the aftermath of the flashflood.

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To fully grasp my sentiments, let me just share my photographer’s note on the on-going exhibit of the Press Photographers of the Philippines (PPP)–Iloilo Chapter at the lower ground floor of SM City Iloilo:

In that rather stormy Saturday of the 21st of June, our lives took a dramatic turn. In an unpredictable manner, water surged violently and literally swallowed everything in its path.

If we talk of Panay’s contemporary history, then Typhoon Frank was our very own “shock and awe.”

No, Bagyo Frank: Sa Litrato is not a footnote to history. This photo exhibit is history. Trite but true, the past is history, the present is history, the future will be history.

In all bluntness, some of the photographs in this collection are not aesthetically exceptional. In fact,some even fail to conform to the standards of the art of photography with lighting and composition techniques being nonexistent.

Notwithstanding the lack of artistic depth, these photographs still serve as a reminder of our collective experience. The images then transcend the “I” perspective. The “I” mutates into a “We” or an “Us.”

More importantly, what makes this collection of photographs worthy is its capacity to move us—to touch the inner being, if not to educate, enlighten, or awaken. It also dares to question our existence in our relation to our environment, which, at times, we take for granted.

A writer once lamented, “Narrative can make us understand. Photographs do something else: they haunt us.” And these images haunt us.

To encapsulate, there is no denying the essence of these photographic images: that they are moving and they are significant in our continuing story as Panayanons—as people of Iloilo, Aklan, Capiz, and Antique. That, in this world fueled by so much uncertainty, humanity, as history has shown, will continue to rise and fall. After all, Typhoon Frank signified life, death, and resurrection.

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This is an open invitation to view Bagyo Frank: Sa Litrato. Exhibit runs until August 1, 2008 at the lower ground floor of SM City Iloilo. ***

PPP–Iloilo Chapter is grateful to the support and encouragement of those who made this exhibit possible. Big thanks to Troy Camarista and Kristine Rojo-Yap of SM City Iloilo, Sr. Inspector Erna Foerster of the Photo Artists League of Iloilo (PALI), and Diday’s Delicacies.

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