This is the third in a series of posts exploring the work of five emerging Mexican street photographers. The series will include work from Nayeli Cruz Bonilla, Fermín Guzmán Martínez, Jair Cabrera Torres, Irving Cabrera Torres and Alfredo Moreno. Mark Powell and Tom Griggs have curated and edited this project. All five photographers began their careers as students of Mark's in El Faro de Oriente in Iztapalapa, Mexico City.
Statement
My name is Jair Cabrera, I'm 23 and a photographer, born on April 2, 1988 in Mexico City. I have a graduate degree in Communication Sciences. Ever since I was a child I belonged to and lived on the streets. Six years ago I found photography; now I try to use the camera to tell in great detail every story that happens around me.
I live on the border between Nezahualcoyotl and Iztapalapa. My work has focused on finding a material aesthetic for where I grew up, an area has been poorly represented when someone from outside has been given the job of photographing it. I would like to take apart the myth of what is my space, my people and my family. It is easy from the outside to label and judge without knowing what goes on inside the place. In recent years I have worked with images that represent the everyday life of my neighborhood, a working-class area on the edge of the city. We have been labeled a social threat, I am from and represent a neighborhood in the east of my city, designated a red zone or high-risk area for the high rate of violence, crime and vandalism.