The other day there was a taller (workshop) at entreAmigos that Regina insisted Bola and I go to. It was early for us… but we went. It was like being in elementary art class all over again except with a Finish teacher (Topi). Topi learned how to make globos aerostaticos (aerostatic balloons or something similar…) in a Atatlan, a small town in Guatemala. Coincidentally that is where I think Bola and I will be going in August and September.  That night when Regina, Bola, his brother Cocho, and I went to the beach with a bunch of our friends to light and release them.

Amazing. So simple yet so mind blowing to see something you made of tissue paper float into space by the pure power of fire. And they went amazingly far. Well all of them except Bola’s. That one caught fire and faded into the sea.

You’re supposed to make a wish when you light the globo and if it floats so far that you can’t see it before it catches fire or falls then it comes true. Mine would have come true, but I realized as it glided through the sky that I hadn’t made one.

And then I realized how purely happy I was in the moment. Like a child. Watching my tissue baloon fly through the air.

And I knew then that I didn’t need a wish.

I love my Holga. A Holga is a small black plastic camera that looks like it could be a child’s toy. In a way I guess it is. I’ve found that it helps me get more involved in my shooting. I’m playing rather than shooting.

Seeing things in a new light. Literally.

I love the ethereal feel to the photos. And there is this timelessness about them. Like even though they were taken yesterday they could have been taken fifty years ago and you wouldn’t know.

Here are some shots from the Hacienda del Carmen near Guadalajara.