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A boy plays near a destroyed police car in Momostenango, 150 kilometers (95 miles) west of Guatemala City, in September 2005. Protesters burned government offices and forced public officials to flee the Indian village of Momostenango, local authorities reported. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd

August 2021 - Ojo Latino is a new photography column feature for NPPA’s News Photographer digital magazine. Anita Baca, a photo editor for The Associated Press based in Mexico City, will write an occasional photo column about Latin American photographers.

OJO LATINO {THE LATIN EYE}

En Español

Rodrigo Abd’s award-winning images find the extraordinary in the ordinary

By Anita Baca

“Photos that show contradictory situations are the ones I like most.”

That’s what one of my favorite photojournalists in Latin America, Argentinian Rodrigo Abd, posted on his Facebook page, accompanied by this image of a child playing near a vandalized police car (above) in Guatemala.

Abd wrote, “This image can be taken many ways.” And that got me wondering about “the many ways.”

When Abd’s images appear in The Associated Press’ workspace, they often make me pause, and this image is an Abd classic. At first glance, it appears the child is Photoshopped onto the scene, but he’s not, of course. At its most basic, it’s a child playing amid chaos.

But it is strange how unperturbed the child seems, not the least bit frightened or anxious. How is that? Abd notes that for people who live a calm, orderly life, these situations seem inconceivable, even terrifying. But reality can be harsh in Guatemala. 

Abd is truly is a master at finding the extraordinary in the most ordinary of situations.

Some are delightful, such as the Peruvian family posing on the shore holding a white-frosted birthday cake, or the photo of an 7-year-old Tembe girl using her handmade bow and arrow.

Some are heartbreaking, such as the photo of a pet owner taking his dead dog to be buried at sea, or the fisherman with the oil-stained belly.

Some are tragically beautiful, such as the turquoise ribbon outlining a red sweater found in an exhumed grave.

And some are just plain absurd, such as the image of a migrant’s baby carriage loaded with six sleeping bags.

Security guard Roberto Cortez Tista lies dead in front of the gym where he worked after thieves stole his gun and shot him with it in Guatemala City in September 2003. In the city, fears of common crime have prompted rich and poor alike to arm themselves. Security guards with automatic weapons guard even the smallest businesses. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Forensic anthropologists Edgar Telon, right, and Selket Callejas eat breakfast in August 2009 during a break from exhuming the bodies of nine men in a mass grave who were allegedly tortured and massacred by the Guatemalan army during the civil war in Uspantan, in the Quiche region, Guatemala. Forensic anthropologists have begun to use DNA sampling and analysis to identify victims of human rights abuses committed during this country's 36-year-long civil war that left 200,000 dead and 40,000 disappeared. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd

Abd’s approach is sympathetic, kind and thoughtful. The way he connects with people in his photo making defines his work — and it appeals to me, too.

And now I am drawn into Abd’s philosophy: Look deeper. Think beyond the immediacy of the “bang, bang.”

Although they are not perfectly composed, don’t have the magical light that we seek or show peak action, the incongruity in some of Abd’s images forces you to stop in your tracks and ask: What is happening?

Here in some Latin American countries, residents go about their ordinary lives amid violence fueled by social inequality.

So it was just another day in the neighborhood when Abd arrived at a crime scene, four or five blocks from his Guatemala City home, where a security guard had been shot dead outside the guard’s place of work at a gym.

Inside the gym, (above) regulars continued their workout routines as if nothing were amiss.

But Abd doesn’t judge. Instead, he works to understand the consequences of the country’s violence. He documents the will of beleaguered people who go on living, with the hope that we will engage beyond the surface of his photographs.

Abd has been a staff photographer for The Associated Press since 2003, following four years with La Razón and La Nación newspapers in Buenos Aires.

Over the years, he has worked all over the world, including Syria, Afghanistan and Haiti. But he says his deepest connection is to Latin America, where he has been based in Guatemala City and Lima, Peru. His assignments have taken him to countries such as Cuba, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia and Venezuela.

Along the way, he has been honored with many prestigious awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, World Press, Overseas Press Club, Maria Moors Cabot Prize, Best of Photojournalism, POYi, POYi Latino America and the Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar.

Most recently, Abd has been documenting how COVID-19 has ravaged Peru, working inside hospitals and crematories showing the world the human tragedies caused by the pandemic.

Abd arrived in 2003 in Guatemala, a country grappling with the legacy of a long and bloody civil war that saw citizens abducted, tortured, killed and buried in mass graves. According to a U.N. Truth Commission, about 200,000 people were killed and 40,000 others were “disappeared” during Guatemala’s 1960-96 civil war.

Because so many Guatemalans are still seeking justice for loved ones who were “disappeared,” Abd spent a good amount of time covering the exhumations of people who were massacred.

The photo he made of forensic anthropologists having lunch alongside a grave (above) alarmed the administrators who gave him access. One asked, “How can you show us like this?” They worried that people would consider them disrespectful of the dead.

But Abd disagreed and explained to them that it shows the forensic anthropologists as hardworking and compassionate people, engaged in honorable work. These workers are comfortable among the dead. It’s their work, their office, their daily life.

One of my personal favorites by Abd involved more anthropologists and another exhumation.

After searching for a colleague who’d gone missing while looking for a mass grave site deep in the Peruvian Andes, they feared he was dead but found him collapsed. The group’s anxiety turned to laughter as they looked at their colleague lying face-up on the forest floor (below) and observed that he had never let go of the chicken he’d brought along to cook for supper. That evening, Abd and the anthropologists with family members of the “disappeared” who were working as guides enjoyed a nice chicken soup cooked over a campfire. I’ll bet chicken never tasted so good.

Anita Baca is a photo editor for The Associated Press and is based in Mexico City. She can be reached at [email protected]. Baca will write an occasional photo column for News Photographer about Latin American photographers.

Rodrigo Abd, a Pulitzer Prize winner for his coverage of the Syrian war, joined The Associated Press in 2003. He is currently based in Buenos Aires. Follow his work on Instagram.

Forensic archaeologist Dannal Aramburu lies on the forest ground exhausted but relieved. He had been separated for about three hours from colleagues while walking to a site of mass graves in a remote area of Chungui, Peru, in November 2013. Aramburu never let go of the live chicken at his side, which was that night’s dinner. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A baby carriage belonging to a group of Central American migrants is loaded down with sleeping bags in Mexicali, Mexico, in November 2018. Several thousand Central American migrants arrived in Tijuana the previous week more than a month after leaving Honduras in a caravan. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Fisherman Manuel Nune’s stomach is covered in oil as he cleans up after a day of crab fishing on Lake Maracaibo in Cabimas, Venezuela, in July 2019. Fishermen wash the oil from their bodies with raw gasoline. They say the prickly rash on their skin is the price of survival. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Jonatan Jimenez carries his dead dog, Roco, to the water for the sea to take his body away in La Herradura beach in Chorrillos, Lima, Peru, in October 2015. Jimenez says he always walked on the beach with Roco, so he wanted it to be his final resting place. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
In November 2013, a turquoise ribbon outlines a sweater unearthed in a mass grave. Anthropologists employ the technique to photograph the item’s orientation before its removal. The exhumation in the district of Chungui, Peru, is traumatic for survivors of 1986-87 massacres by soldiers and their paramilitary allies of women and children left behind by fleeing Shining Path rebels. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A man holding his birthday cake poses for a photo with his family on the shore of Agua Dulce beach in Lima, Peru, in February 2020. The half-mile-long (kilometer-long) strip of grayish-brown sand 12 miles (20 kilometers) south of central Lima is a haven for the working classes, a place where visitors from the Andean highlands first dip a toe in the sea. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Seven-year-old Emilia Tembe pulls back on her handcrafted toy bow and arrow made of sticks and leaves as she stands on a fallen tree, in the Ka’a kyr village, Para state, Brazil, in September 2019. “This part used to be a native forest. This was primary jungle. But the fire arrived, and it cleared the land,” said Emidio Tembe, Emilia’s grandfather and the Ka ’a kyr chieftain who named the village. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A worker is seen partially submerged as he tries to repair a broken pipe in Caracas, Venezuela, in September 2012. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A television reporter walks through a mud puddle toward people waiting for Pope Francis to arrive at the Palmasola prison in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, in July 2015. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Bobby and Chato curl up inside an old suitcase as protection against the winter temperatures on the outskirts of Lima, Peru, in June 2020. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A coffee cup remains on the rim of a pool at La Reunion Golf Resort & Residences, destroyed by the eruption of the Volcano of Fire in San Miguel Los Lotes, Guatemala, in June 2018. Here and there are unmistakable signs of a hasty evacuation before the June 3 eruption. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Relatives take cellphone pictures of the remains of Fortunate Ventura Huamacusi, a man who was killed by the Peruvian army in 1983, before placing the coffin in its niche at the Rosaspata cemetery in Peru’s Ayacucho province in August 2018. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A gown hangs from twisted metal as residents comb through a field of post-earthquake debris in Manta, Ecuador, in April 2016. The earthquake damage added to the already heavy economic hardships being felt in this OPEC nation because of a collapse in world oil prices. Before the quake, Ecuador was bracing for a bout of austerity, with the International Monetary Fund forecasting the economy would shrink 4.5% in 2016. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
Residents repair an electric cable in the Nueva Esperanza neighborhood of Lima, Peru, in June 2020 amid the coronavirus pandemic. The inability to keep people at home is proving a major factor in the unchecked spread of the new coronavirus around the continent, where new cases and deaths are rising unchecked. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd
A man points as Oliver Duque, a homeless boy, lies on top of a Venezuelan national flag during a demonstration called by opposition politician Juan Guaidó. Guaidó was urging masses into the streets in Maracaibo, Venezuela, to force President Nicolás Maduro from power in November 2019. AP photo by Rodrigo Abd

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