Rose: Can you introduce yourself to our readers please? 

Andres: Yes my name is Andres Alejandro Chavez. I was born in and am originally from Caracas, Venezuela. I moved here to the United State, in Chicago in 2013 to go to school for visual communications, mostly graphic design and some photography. I currently do graphic design and photography professionally. I also consider myself a visual artist at least in terms of exhibit design though I have primarily focused on my work as a street photographer. Now, I am working on mixing together my past interests and my work in photojournalism. In pursuit of my passion for both communication and photography, to inject a “use” to the art that I love to make with the ultimate goal of giving a voice to those without one.

R: What brought you to Albany Park specifically?

A: I moved to the city, I had absolutely no money and no connection to the city besides one friend. I landed in Hyde Park at an apartment with this one old dude with dementia. But no one told me, or seemingly him, that he had it. After that, my friend needed to also get out of his living situation and we moved together to not quite Albany Park but to like Damen and Ainslie. Like the Lincoln square area. 

C: Ah yes, the Lawrence bus. *nodding knowingly*

A: Oh yea. My life is literally along Lawrence. So then I moved a couple times, trying to find a neighborhood that is both affordable, close to things, and has a really good community, and I eventually ended up here in AP, a neighborhood with both latinos and habibis. Which is perfect for me. 

R: What first drew you to the Albany Park Free Store? What did that first day that you came in look like?

A: Well. I didn’t want to get involved at first because it sounded like too much responsibility. I don’t like committing to things, but my roommate suggested that we should do it. And I said no. But I always say that I’m not going to do something and end up doing it anyway. Haha. So I went to the free store. It’s by where I live so it was really easy to get involved.

R: After that initial day, why did you decide to keep coming back?

A: I wanted to keep myself busy with side projects. But also, I wanted to get involved in the community where I lived. I think that is so important. You know, as an anarchist I’ve always believed that you can’t depend on authority to fix your life, you just have to do it. If you have any extra energy then you should put that back into your community. I also carry a feeling where since I have had so many people help me in my life in the past, that I feel this massive responsibility to pay it back to others. The DIY thing like at the freestore is the best way to do that and to fight capitalism. The whole thing also is that it already exists and I could easily join in. 

R: How did you feel like you fit in? Or start to get to know people?

A: Being from Venezuela, I speak Spanish so I feel like at times, I can be an effective communicator. That’s where my skills fit the most, like I can guide people through the processes there, and I am also good with logistics. I tend to be able to think of the positives, negatives, and how to complete a task in a way that takes everything into account. I think those are the skills that I can bring into the space, to be of use. While I am very terrible at organizing and sorting, I make up for this with “Tall” and I can lift things and put things down. So to answer your question, that's how I found a way to fit in there. 

R: Yesss, that’s awesome. Haha. Ok so I think we’re going to move in a bit of a different direction now and talk a bit more in depth about your photography. Starting from the beginning, how did you first become interested in photography?

A: This might be long, haha, I apologize. It all started in 2010, when there was a massive earthquake in Haiti. There was a photo of a girl in a red dress, roughly 10 years old who had been killed in the quake. People were trying to take advantage of the situation or taking things out of desperation, not trying to cast judgment on that, but in the photo, people were walking past her with stuff in their hands as she lay on the floor. Then, there was another photo that came alongside that one, that showed the same girl on the ground but with a line of between 11 and 15 photographers that were all taking the same photograph of the girl on the floor and the people looting. I have always been drawn into those ethical and moral dilemmas that question “how do you tell a story?” in a way that does justice to the story, its truth, but does not try to fit this capitalist ideal or framework that encourages yellow journalism or exaggerates the truth to force emotion out of it, simply for the sake of that one specific narrative and for profit. Anyway after seeing that photo, I wanted to be able to navigate these types of questions. That’s where it began. 

Then when I came to the US, my intention was to originally go to school for journalism. While that didn’t work out, about 4 years ago I was getting back into photography, focusing mostly on street photography, documenting Chicago, the culture, things that were happening. While I had been doing this, Israel then began their genocidal campaign in Gaza, and I started documenting the protests. Then documenting the protests meant I was documenting police brutality, and documenting police brutality meant documenting the migrant crisis, and while I hate that phrasing, it involved many of my people being here. I would speak to them and then take their photos, in a way that shares their story and humanizes them, which is the ultimate goal. Humanizing people and showing that their stories matter. That they matter. That is what keeps me doing this work. 

R: Do you have a specific artistic practice or process when you start seeking out subjects or people to cover, like deciding whose stories to tell?

A: As a street photographer, one of my mentors in street photography used to tell me, “There are no rules in street photography. You just have to do it.” You basically walk around, take in the space, take in the people. Take in the culture, take in the moment. But then when you go into journalism, there are very clear rules that you set for yourself, that also are ethical but also help develop your credibility as a communicator. I always try to show something that feels real. I don’t go for hyper-curated or trends, or something that is even necessarily aesthetically pleasing. 

I think it can be kind of exploitative though, in the way I've seen it. It weird because any kind of street photography or even journalism will be to some degree exploitative. You kind of have to take it. If there is someone crying because they are shook, do I take that photo? It's interesting because that is something that I have to decide at the moment. Do I take the photo? Do I press the shutter? If there is someone going through the worst days of their life? 

When you are a photojournalist you are an advocate for your story. That’s how I see it, I am an advocate for the person whose story I am telling. So doing it from a place of fairness, a place of honesty, a place of goodness, it's extremely important, and that's where a lot of people fall short. Conversely, in street photography, one of my mentors called it emotional pickpocketing, because you are just going there and grabbing moments, like low hanging fruit. I don’t know if that’s the right way to say it. I just don’t want to be one of those Instagram weirdos who just take photos of attractive women or men just to get their information or to be creepy. I am looking for a bigger documentation of the zeitgeist, the cultural movement that is happening. Like taking a picture of an unhoused person, you are not taking a photo of that person, you are taking a photo of that person’s situation. And that is exploitative, to me. And even though things overlap, I have to walk that line whenever I am doing any photos. 

R: Who is the mentor you mentioned earlier?

A: I have so many mentors, it's amazing. It’s a bunch of incredible women photo artists. My main photography mentor is Denise Kiem, she studied at the center of photojournalism at Chicago. An in- fuckin- credible street photographer. And then Raven Geury, from Unravelled, she's been such a big help in navigating and learning how to tell a story, learning how to investigate a story, learning how to craft, and see and having conversations about journalism and the line between journalism and activism. I have Lauren Meranda, who was my visual arts/graphic design mentor, who taught me when I was learning how to navigate spaces where you have to communicate with an image. I would claim those three as my main mentors. She’s also a professor at NEIU right here on Foster.

Talking as more of a visual artist, truly anything is inspiration. You can start deconstructing everything. Concepts, visual elements etc. so that’s one of the coolest things, is that everything or anything can be inspiration. Like you can steal the tone in a scene from a movie, you can steal a color palette from a particular painter. You can steal the viewpoint in a photo from a photographer that you like. 

C: What is your favorite artist? What I'm hearing is that life is your inspiration hahah. 

A: Life is my inspiration haha. But seriously though. Whenever I do street photography, I try to do black and white photography. But I am very inspired by a baroque artist, Caravaggio, who has very interesting shadow play, where figures are coming out of the shadows. 

R: yessss. Chirascuro! 

A: There is William Klein, who did very gritty photography, showing the reality of life. 

So ya I would say Caravagio, I would say William Klein, I would say Robert Frank, who is another photographer. He has these photography essays/ book called the Americans. (Originally from Switzerland, lived in Canada), he traveled across America and took all of these unfiltered photographs of this country trying to get at and show its essence, like what is this country?I can find inspiration from that photo of the girl in Haiti, like the concept of that photo. Being able to look at that photo from a different perspective, through the lens of a photographer and then also through the lens of a spectator. So I would say there is, not to be cliché and say everything can be inspiring, but it is like truly you can deconstruct and analyze everything and use that to communicate better. 

R: When you are looking at a particular subject that you want to photograph, what are you drawn to? 

A: I do have this theory that photography, street photography and even journalism, is very instinctual. Because you can look at something and then say something is going to happen here. And then you have the camera and you're looking at what you think is going to happen. There's an artist, whose whole thing is talking about the decisive moment, the peak of an action, that is what you are there to capture. So lets say someone is jumping over a puddle, which is one of his most famous photographs, and it's the moment where the person is floating, the person is suspended, gravity doesn't exist. That is the specific moment. If you see him going up, you're like oh this person is going up. If you see him going down, then it breaks his illusion. But there is like one... a sweet spot where the person is floating. Knowing and figuring out where to stand, where to be, the camera settings that are right for it, that is what every street photographer is looking for, that decisive moment. Every single photo has something that speaks to me as a human. granted 95% of my photos are trash, they are terrible and i delete them or i dont use them but every time I take a photo its because there is something there. 

R: You have been doing street photography or slash journalism of protests. I was wondering how does looking for that subject change when you are doing protests or I guess journalism in general?

A: I am technically an independent photo journalist, a freelancer. But yeah its very different because when i am doing street photography I dont think there are any rules, I can frame things however i want to frame them, I can take photos of people that are not necessarily true to the moment but it is a moment that happened. I don't delete things in the photos. I only have to think about the visual elements that I am capturing and the moment itself and however I want to frame it. I'm trying to tell a story, I'm trying to figure out a way of presenting something, but I don't necessarily have to be true to the moment. I would like to be true to the essence of the moment.

When I am doing journalism, I do have to think of it as if you see this photo without context, is it hiding something? Can this photo be used to tell the opposite side of what I am trying to tell, those are the considerations that I have to take.

R: If you are an advocate for your subjects as a street photographer, do you feel the same way when you are photographing protests and movements?

A: When I am doing that, I am taking photos of how I see the event happening. When I am taking photos as a photo journalist I am an advocate for the story. I’m an advocate for... whatever that means. So if i am doing a story for someone, I like to think of myself as an advocate for the subject or an advocate for what is happening. and my job is to tell that truthfully and honestly and ethically and what not. For example, there was a protest by lake shore drive where one of the palestinian protests, where at one point the protestors rushed and took over lake shore drive. The whole thing, a couple hours long, was extremely peaceful. Then like 15 minutes of mayhem and the rest of the 2 hours it was just peaceful just people walking around, they went around the park twice and then everyone went home. But I have a couple of very very dramatic shots from those 15 min. Those photos, as photos, could stand by themselves, but as a story they don't stand...they don't hold up to the scrutiny of just the one photo to represent what had happened that day without showing that 90% of the day was just sitting down, bored, taking photos of dogs.

R: When you are covering a protest. and you're taking pictures of people who may not be represented well in a photo or something, if you're an advocate for truth which is very important, how would you treat your subjects?

A: That is such a tough question to answer. In reality I am also an activist. I try to make a separation when I am covering as a journalist, but that being said it's really difficult to say that I don't sympathize. A lot of that I will leave to my editors. 

Like for example when I went to MN I was working with Raven with Unraveled because I was there to cover for Unraveled and she is very cautious of that. She is very aware of how we present the activists, not necessarily trying to hide or anything but its like you don't have to show someone's face to show what is happening. 

Especially in a world of surveillance. In a world... in a country where right now... there is retaliation for anyone that is not following this Zionist agenda. Then there can be repercussions to that. So there are considerations that go into that. I think that German newspapers will literally block people's faces, will censor peoples faces and what not. I don't necessarily think that is the best way to go about it. I hope i dont get cancelled for saying this but I think that if you are planning on doing stuff like that you should cover your face. Anything that i am taking a photo of, there's already another camera taking a photo of them, there's cameras in the streets, there's someone live streaming. 

But my job is to document everything and then my editor's job is to say we're going to show these photos. We're not going to show those photos. I can take photos of anything because unless there is a warrant to see my SD card, police officers cannot go through my photos. I do take that into consideration when I'm making photos public, making sure that no one is going to get in trouble for something. But that is definitely always a consideration. I'm also an activist and organizer. That being said, if I am there as a reporter, my job is to document.

If you don’t want people to know your participation you have to take it into consideration. Though we are capturing emotions, that is the strongest way to communicate, and it's hard to show emotion without showing a face. It's a really fine line. It gets considered heavily. but in my position is this photo that is going to show someone's face going to do justice or can I tell the story without showing the face. Those are lines that I am constantly trying to figure out as I'm documenting things on the streets.

R: In an artistic sense then whether it is just for yourself or for a journalistic purpose does the way that you approach your subject in your artistic craft change?

A: I am looking for something that speaks to the human condition, I hate using that word because it sounds too grandiose or whatever but I’m here to document. I was having this conversation with someone where my photos, my street photography, is not relevant right now. It will be relevant in 30 years. I’m working right now for 30 years in the future. When we go, oh what is happening during the genocide, when we go there was no one fighting against the genocidal state of isreal. and its like no there were people fighting and I have proof.

R: An archival purpose?

A: Yeah, yeah exactly. that is how i see the purpose of my street photography

When I am doing photo journalism, there is this essay....it kind of ties back to before when we were talking about inspiration. There is this typography essay called the crystal goblet. When you're talking about typography it's just letters, arranging letters, picking the right font but it is so important in the way that you tell the story with how you do that. because you want typography to be a crystal goblet when you're drinking wine. So when you're drinking wine from a gold cup you can't see the wine inside. You can't see it. It's a beautiful golden cup but you are missing part of the experience of wine which is the physical texture of it. If you're using this elaborate thing that makes it difficult to drink the wine, it's hindering your experience of drinking. When you're drinking from a crystal goblet the purpose of the goblet is to hold the wine and for you to be able to basically ignore it completely. The best way to do it is with something that you don't even think about so you are enjoying all the qualities of wine without thinking about the glass you're using. so it is the same thing as photography. As a journalist you want to create something that is well crafted but what I want is for people to not look at the photos and get distracted by the editing or all these things but to just feel like they were there and they are able to take in visually with the text, kind of what happened. So when you're reading, you're seeing, even if you are not reading you are seeing things that will tell the story of the event that I was covering.When I am doing journalism, the idea is that you don't even feel like it's a photo. You're just looking at an event. 

R: Awesome, thank you so much. (: