Lodovico interviews Diana Borrego Martinez Gonzalez

Dear Diana,

I’d like to talk with you about Fred, in these months I felt close to him and now it looks  as though I knew him, and of course  that’s just a feeling.

I shook hands and looked into your eyes and that would be fine, but I have to know more as I have to write something more. If you agree, I would start now.

1.

How did you happen to meet with Fred, el Tio Fred, lo Zio Fred, casi un padre, how was it and what was your impression when you got to know him?

I met Fred and Julia when I moved to San Jose with my son’s father who is Chileno.  Fred    and   Julia had worked with the church in helping the Chilean refugees settle in San Jose.  This is how and why I met Fred and Julia.

My first impression of Fred was that of a ruff man who spoke without thinking of the consequences but in reality he was speaking the truth.  Also, because he and Julia reminded me of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo.  She was small and thin and he was tall a bit thick around the waist.

2.

Family people leave a permanent mark in our heart , something  engraved that can’t be erased, that we bring along with us for good.  What do you think about it?

Fred and Julia were always there for me.  I was a single mother and they were my support system.  My son had a wonderful childhood because of them.  Fred was the scientist, the science teacher, the one who always provided lectures for us even when we did not want to hear them.  I and my son miss those lectures.  His wealth of wisdom, knowledge of life and world history.

3.

Looking at the portraits that were shot by Fred, whom I never met, I got  two different kinds of feeling, a  deep melancholy and a sort of tiredeness or better a disillusion.

But I also felt  the eye of a man who was able to look further ahead, and that therefore could not bear the limits that all kinds of society impose.

(I may be wrong, but it happens to me when I look at pictures in general. I get influenced and carried away by them,. I know that’s not always the correct way, I am conditioned.)

What is your feeling about them?

He did not take random shots, his photos were always well planned, and well documented.  All of the individuals in his portraits you can be sure he spoke to them, more than once.  He loved talking to people, specially those whom he thought were interesting subjects and whose face, posture, or surroundings could tell a story. He spoke to all, social status was not a barrier. 

He was a very melancholy man and sentimental.  Just reading the newspaper would affect his mood.  He wanted the right solutions for everything. 

Tired and disillusion, yes very much so.  His family fled Europe because of Hitler and arrived in America to find a racist society with different laws for the whites than for the blacks.  This was very difficult for the family who had been outspoken in Europe and now could not in America because of the times and being recent immigrants.

He and Julia were involved in many struggles and after the Sixties things slowed down and the movement never really recovered.

4.

What was your impression when you first discovered that Fred had shot so many photos?

I really did not know how many photos he had taken until after he died.

Do you remember what you felt when you  held one in your hands for the very first time?

This took a long time to happen because he didn’t show his photos often, it had to be a special time, or a visit from  someone he knew and they wanted to see his photos.  And, we all had to wear gloves, but first wash our hands well.

I lived with Fred and Julia (his wife) and the first time, I believe, was when he was printing and he brought up a print for Julia to see.  (His darkroom was in the basement of the house).  Julia was his critic and the observer.  I did not know much about photography but I loved his images, they told a story.

5.

Today Fred’s photos have finally started telling their own stories from a place that is  very far away from where  they were originally shot.

Now such a discovery is being started from Italy, the first people that watched them are Italians.

It can possibly mean that big distances don’t exist anymore...

Is that so,or is it just that some people are able to look at, and understand the various tones and shades of the World?

Fred was a pesamista and a perfectionist.  Many times I asked him if we could do an exhibit at the public library in San Jose, but he worried that it would cost too much to frame the prints properly, and the space also had to be just right.  Fred was his own obstacle.  The first time we received the letter from Daniele Ravenna indicating his interest on having a show, it took Fred over a year or longer to commit to it.  He did not know what photo to send, how to send them, what action to take to make sure nothing happened to them, etc…

And all this time he had two portfolios he had prepared years back, with notations and all…but he could not get himself to send them, or would allow me to do it.  This finally got accomplished because Daniele Ravenna and Irene personally came to visite him in San Jose.

Yes, distance does not exhit anymore, something that was very difficult for Fred to acknowledge.  Most of his travels were done by either driving or taking the train.

You’re asking me if some people are able to look at, and understand the various tones and shades of the World...Well, I recall a story Fred told me about him being in Mexico and asking a lady for her opinion on two photos he had with him, one was taken and developed by someone else and the other by him.  The woman chose Fred’s picture.  He asked her why, her answer was because it looked like it was made (printed) more carefully, it was lovelier.  The woman was not wealthy, or educated, she was a peasant.  I think Fred thought of all individuals as being able to tell the differences between excellence and mediocrity.

Also, I believe that it takes an outsider to make these discoveries and then bring them back home.  This was the case with Hansel Mieth and Otto Hagel. 

7.

What was your impression about the inauguration?

I was in disbelief!  Finally Fred’s photos were on exhibit for a small portion of the world, the Italians, to see them.  The location, the cantina, seemed just right, perfect, for his exhibit.  The setting created a mood, melanconico. 

I was there, at the cantina, several days later, by myself for about 30 minutes.  The ambiente was all Fred, it filled my spirit and made me sad.  I cried remembering him and Julia. 

Thank you for all the time you have put on this project, without knowing Fred, and yet you captured his spirit in these questions you have asked of me.

Diana Borrego

dianaborregomartinezgonzalez@yahoo.com

2400 N. Main St., Unit E

Salinas, CA 93906

831 240 8601

A Trattoria on Via San Giovanni sul Muro.

There’s a rather secluded Trattoria on Via San Giovanni sul Muro. One of those that once was easy to find in Milan; you could recognize them from the chequered tablecloth and  wine in the glass canters. It lies on the upper floor of a quite anonymous bar. You have to walk up a steep wooden stair that isn’t inviting at all. Before putting one’s foot upon the first step, the most experienced ones raise their heads to make sure anybody else isn't coming down. You reach your goal slowly and cautiously step by step. The landlady, or the “sciura” as the most affectionate habitués call her, seats you at the table, though you definitely must wait for her to do it, otherwise you might be getting into troubles. She has an energetic character, I would dare say straightforward, and quite rough at times, but those who want to come to this place have to comply with that. A few days ago, exactly last Thursday, I had the opportunity to meet with Daniele Ravenna at the Trattoria.

He and Felix Humm are Fred Iltis’s friends. They conceived, studied and did everything about what’s happening with the photographer’s work.

Once we were seated by the sciura, I could finally ask my guest, or at this point I should say my friend: “ Daniele, don’t you think it’s about time to start saying something to our bloggers?”

“Yes, I think I may want to do it. The whole idea of bringing more people to know Fred Ilits’s work, starting with a photo show, originated from the memories that we conserved from thirty years ago. Those memories inspired us. We had lost contact with him, but we did still remember the photographs that he kept in the basement below the wooden house where he lived in San Jose, California. A very similar house to many others in a suburban neighborhood that today has become quite central. For sure the atmosphere is rather different from the memories of my first journey. Today the neighborhood is populated by mexican-american families that replaced the previous Italian immigrates. On Lick Avenue where Fred lived, there used to be a cannery until few years ago where they made peeled tomatoes, one of the Italian specialties.” “Did you taste the peeled tomatoes?” I asked Daniele. He smiled slightly turning his face to the right and touching his moustaches with his forefinger “Well, I didn’t”, he went on, talking about the origins of the neighborhood.  “Josie, Josephine Cali, the one hundred year old who lived on the other side of the road, knew only a few Italian words, and many Brooklyn slang words of the “broccolino” talk that was typical of Brooklyn; they said “u baccause” (the back of the house) for  “bathroom”, because toilets in the immmigrates slums was in the back.” At that point Daniele got silent and looked astray. His thoughts were lost for a moment beyond the paintings on the opposite wall. “But that’s another story. Let’s go back to Fred in San Jose, California. Down below in his basement where he developed the negatives in an old bathtub and where he printed, using a slow and complicated process.

Fred was a biology professor at the university, he had earned his Ph.D. in entomology at U.C. Davis; he was a guy wih his own rules, apparently rational, like a scientist can be; he deeply knew nature.” Daniele went on with a smile “When you followed him out, walking his dog Lobo, he kept stopping at each plant or bush that drew his attention and started talking about them. He rarely spoke about his photos, he had a sense of modesty and discretion, a sort of jealousy.” I interrupted him “Now let’s talk about his photos. Sure the blog was recently opened, but the editors, Mattia and myself, haven’t written anything yet.”

“All right. His photos. Many of the shots were from his journeys in Mexico, ‘south of the border’.

He rarely shot ‘stolen photos’. He liked to talk with people first, he tried to know them, to overcome the distrust of those who watched the unknown traveller arriving at their own small town or village in the middle of nothing. Whoever will be that gringo who’s hanging around with a camera? Fred did the best he could with his Spanish. He introduced himself, he collected informations; he might come back on another day. So you can understand the portraits, specially those of the women, the most reserved and shy facing a camera, carrying their bundles, and their everyday’s worries, and their children.

In my opinion,Fred was an American who had never stopped thinking like a European from Mitteleuropa. He was born in Czechoslowakia and was a kind of an alien in a country that had never completely become his own, maybe because he’d never chosen it, having been a refugee who had arrived to the United States at the age of 15. He was a pessimist and he may have had good reasons to be like that; his disillusion was smoothed by the gentleness of his wife Julia, who softened the disciplined attitude of a character that had a natural bent for analysis (after all he was a biologist).

He also and specially was allergic to injustice and he was conscious of the discrepancy between the basic principles of the founding fathers of his new country’s constitution and their fulfilment in reality. He had an aversion to “gleichgestaltet” thought, the German definition he used for the equalized wavelength of thought which is typical of totalitarian regimes, where everybody has to listen to one voice, one program only.

He had a great sense of hospitality. We met then, in very much open minded times, that’s for sure, but that doesn’t mean everybody was like that; he accepted people as they were, smoothing down his kind of earnest approach…If he hadn’t been like that, we would have never met him.”

The spaghetti with meatsauce had arrived and the interview was over.

Now I can write that we know a little more about Fred, and that our discovery voyage has stepped a bit further.

Before concluding I’d like to break news with a flash that has already been anticipated in one of the received comments. Soon in November we’re going to have here in Milano from Salinas, California, a person who knew Fred very well: Diana Borrego Martinez Gonzalez. 

I’m looking forward to being back to you with more news, or even better, to having her directly tell more stories about Fred. 

I often close my articles saying: Milano does exhist! This time I can even more say so!

Una trattoria in Via San Giovanni Sul Muro.

C’è una trattoria in Via San Giovanni sul Muro abbastanza nascosta. E’ una di quelle trattorie che una volta era facile trovare a Milano, riconoscibili per le tovaglie a quadretti e il vino in caraffa di vetro.  Il locale si trova al piano superiore di un bar abbastanza anonimo. Per arrivarci bisogna salire una ripida scaletta di legno a chiocciola per nulla invitante, non a caso il locale si chiana "al burla giò". I più esperti, prima di mettere il piede sul primo gradino sollevano il capo verso l’alto per assicurarsi che nessun avventore scenda. Lentamente e prestando attenzione a ogni gradino si arriva a destinazione. Subito la “sciura”, così la chiamano tra di loro gli avventori affezionati, ti sistema al tuo tavolo, ma bisogna assolutamente aspettare che lo faccia lei altrimenti sono guai. La sciura è un personaggio energico, oserei dire molto sbrigativo e a volte anche piuttosto ruvida, ma chi vuole frequentare questo locale si deve adattare. L’altro giorno, esattamente giovedì scorso, ho avuto l’opportunità di incontrare il Dottor Daniele Ravenna, proprio in questa trattoria.  Daniele Ravenna con Felix Hum sono i due amici di Fred Iltis, che hanno pensato, studiato e realizzato tutto quello che sta avvenendo intorno alla figura e all’opera di questo fotografo.

La sciura ci ha fatto accomodare a un tavolo, finalmente ho potuto chiedere al mio ospite, ma meglio dire amico «Daniele è finalmente venuto il momento di iniziare a raccontare qualche cosa ai lettori del blog, che pensi?» «sì, credo di poterlo fare.  L’idea di far conoscere a tutti le opere di Fred Iltis e di iniziare con una mostra fotografica a lui dedicata nasce da un ricordo lontano, che ha prodotto un’ispirazione: ritrovare un amico di cui si era persa traccia, non sapevamo più niente di lui da una trentina d’anni.  Infatti, insieme a Felix conservavo il ricordo delle fotografie che Fred teneva in cantina, sotto la sua casa di legno a San Jose in California, simile alle altre case di un quartiere come tanti, oggi diventato centrale. Certo l’atmosfera è molto cambiata rispetto ai ricordi del mio primo viaggio.  Oggi il quartiere è abitato da famiglie mexican-american, subentrate ai precedenti immigrati di origine italiana. Pensa che sulla Lick Avenue, la strada dove abitava Fred Iltis, fino a pochi anni fa c’era una cannery, dove facevano i pelati in scatola, una specialità degli italiani» «Hai assaggiato quei pelati?» ho chiesto, Daniele ha sorriso piegando leggermente il viso verso destra e toccandosi i baffi col dito indice «no, no….» poi ha proseguito, tornando a parlare delle origini del quartiere « Josie, Josephine Cali, una donna centenaria che abitava di fronte a Fred, conosceva qualche parola, e molte di broccolino, il dialetto di Brooklyn; pensa che per dire gabinetto diceva u baccause, the backhouse (dietro la casa), perché nei quartieri degli immigrati il gabinetto era nel retro» a questo punto del discorso, Daniele ha fatto una pausa e ha guardato nel vuoto. Il suo pensiero per un attimo si è perso oltre i quadri appesi alla parete di fronte «Ma questa è un’altra storia. Torniamo a Fred, a San Jose in California: giù in cantina, dove lui sviluppava le pellicole usando una vecchia vasca da bagno e stampava applicando un metodo laborioso e complicato.

Fred era un professore di biologia all’università, si era laureato in entomologia a Davis; un tipo rigoroso, apparentemente razionale, uno scienziato; conoscitore della natura» un sorriso «quando lo accompagnavi nella passeggiata che faceva con il cane, il suo Lobo, si fermava ogni tre passi perché c’era sempre una pianta o un arbusto che lo attirava, di cui cominciava a raccontare. Delle foto parlava meno spesso, c’era una specie di pudore, di gelosia…» l’ho interrotto dicendo «Ecco parlami delle fotografie. Certo il blog è aperto da poco ma noi redattori, cioè Mattia ed io non abbiamo ancora scritto niente» «Già le foto! Molte le aveva fatte viaggiando in Messico, “a sud del confine”. Non faceva quasi mai “foto rubate”; al contrario, cercava di parlare prima con le persone, provava a conoscerle, a vincere la diffidenza che i viaggiatori sconosciuti destano in chi li vede arrivare nel proprio paese o villaggio sperduto. Chi sarà questo gringo che gira con una macchina fotografica? Fred, facendo del suo meglio con lo spagnolo, si presentava, chiedeva, s’informava; magari tornava il giorno dopo. Così si spiegano i ritratti che ha fatto, soprattutto quelli delle donne, le più schive e restie a farsi riprendere, con i loro fardelli quotidiani, i pensieri, i bambini.

Come americano, Fred non aveva mai smesso secondo me di continuare a pensare ancora come un europeo della Mitteleuropa. Era nato in Cecoslovacchia, e in America viveva un po’ estraniato da una realtà che forse non aveva mai fatto sua, forse perché non l’aveva scelta, essendo arrivato profugo negli Stati Uniti a soli quindici anni.

Era un pessimista, forse con buone ragioni per esserlo: il suo disincanto era mitigato dalla dolcezza della moglie, Julia, che smussava le asperità di un carattere portato ad analizzare (dopo tutto era un biologo). Era anche e soprattutto allergico alle ingiustizie, non gli sfuggiva la discrepanza tra i principi fondamentali, quelli dei padri fondatori della costituzione del suo nuovo paese, e la loro applicazione pratica, nella realtà.

Gli dispiaceva la visione dove tutto è appiattito, gleichgestaltet come diceva lui, una parola che si usava in tedesco per definire la sintonizzazione di una radio, dove tutti sono costretti ad ascoltare una sola voce, un solo programma.

Aveva un grande senso dell’ospitalità, erano anni di apertura, certo, ma non era di tutti; accettava le persone, ammorbidendo la rigorosità…diversamente, se non fosse stato così, non lo avremmo mai incontrato». Gli spaghetti con il ragù erano arrivati e qui si è conclusa l'intervista. 

Posso scrivere che qualche cosa di più sappiamo e che il nostro viaggio alla scoperta di Fred ha fatto un passo avanti. 

Prima di concludere vorrei ridare una notizia che è già stata pubblicata in uno dei commenti che abbiamo ricevuto, presto ariverà da Salinas, California, nel mese di novembre, una persona che ha vissuto per molti anni a San Jose con Fred Iltis e che lo conobbe molto bene: Diana Borrego Martinez Gonzalez.  Spero presto di darvi notizie o meglio di far raccontare qualche cosa di più su Fred proprio da lei. 

Spesso concludo i miei articoli scrivendo: Milano c’è! Questa volta, più di altre, posso affermarlo!

Intervista a un esperto di storia dell'iconografia

Vi invito a leggere un'interessante intervista, che sono riuscito a carpire ad un noto storico milanese - meglio chiamarlo "esperto" per evitare di suscitare delle reazioni in lui - in iconografia. L'intervista al Dottor Carlangelo Tosi è stata appena pubblicata sul blog http://www.lodovicovalentiniperugia.com/