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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery Ninety: 101 ways to interpret Bolivia > Educational dialogue, Sucre, Bolivia, 2014
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21-MAY-2014

Educational dialogue, Sucre, Bolivia, 2014

Sucre has a modest population of only 225,000 people. Almost 15 per cent of them – more than 30,000 – take courses at its San Francisco Xavier University. Founded here in 1624, the university has campuses all over Sucre, virtually creating a city within a city. In this photograph, a student is engaged in a dialogue with a teacher just outside one of its walled campuses. The teacher listens as the student uses an emphatic hand gesture to drive home his point. I anchor the scene by filling my foreground with the woman wearing a red vest. It identifies her as a Sucre city employee. She seems to be thinking about joining the discussion across the street, yet her hand gesture indicates hesitance. This image interprets an aspect of education as viewed in a somewhat incongruous context. I make use of my vantage point behind the city employee to thrust my viewers into the mix, encouraging us to join the conversation as well.

FujiFilm X-M1
1/500s f/22.0 at 50.0mm iso640 full exif

other sizes: small medium large original auto
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Phil Douglis03-Aug-2014 20:12
Thanks, Celia, for commenting on the hands. When I am photographing on the streets, I am always looking for ways to relate people to each other in both space and time. I try to find vantage points where I can relate near to far as well. That is what is happening here. All three of these people were standing still, and that helped. I was able to make many shots from this position as the two men talked and the woman wondered. This was the most expressive of those images. My timing was good here, but I had to earn this moment through time, patience, and good fortune.
Cecilia Lim01-Aug-2014 21:04
Wow! This image is all about hands and they are wonderfully expressive. Each person is a different primary color and each of their hands are telling a different story. The tension and anticipation of the woman's hands about to nudge her eye glasses are killing me! Your timing is brilliant!
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