Cristóbal Hara: Starting Out
In the early stages of his career, Cristóbal Hara felt free to take chances, to try things without knowing where they would lead. That freedom—rooted in uncertainty and discovery—was the period he remembers with the greatest enthusiasm. Looking back, he suspects that some of his strongest photographs emerged precisely when he still saw himself as an apprentice, someone learning rather than someone who believed he had mastered the medium. Once he began to feel sure of his methods and applied them systematically, the spark of unpredictability faded; the pressure to deliver results limited his ability to experiment. Over the course of more than five decades, he has repeatedly returned to that beginner’s state of mind: when he attempted portraiture for the first time, when he turned to color, or when he began photographing wild horses. In 1968, at twenty-two, he was studying Business Administration in Germany. Encountering Henri Cartier-Bresson’s images of Spain changed the course of his life: he decided he wanted to become a photographer rather than a businessman. Having left Spain to avoid compulsory military service under Franco, he ultimately returned and resigned himself to it. With no photography schools to attend, he learned by walking the streets of Cuenca, spending long hours photographing while waiting to be drafted, noticeably older than the other recruits. Children would trail behind him, eager to be photographed—a completely ordinary request at the time. When he finally entered boot camp, he hid a small Leica IIIf from 1953 in his kit and photographed secretly. Being caught could have meant prison. After finishing his service, he began traveling through Spain and later journeyed to Yugoslavia with his first wife. When she received a scholarship to the London School of Economics, they moved to London. There he started working with agencies and magazines, leaving behind the phase in which he could still call himself a novice.
This book brings together the photographs that shaped his foundation as an image-maker. Hara writes that he wishes he could reclaim that sense of being a beginner—not to turn back time, although the thought is tempting, but to recover the drive for experimentation, discovery, risk, and transcendence that once propelled his work.
About the Author
Cristóbal Hara, born in Madrid in 1946 to a German mother, spent his childhood moving between the Philippines, the United States, Germany, and Spain. He initially pursued studies in law and business administration in Madrid, Hamburg, and Munich, but in 1969 chose to devote himself fully to photography. After several years living in London—where his work was shown at the Victoria & Albert Museum in 1974—he relocated to Spain in 1980.
His images have been featured in international publications such as Creative Camera, Aperture, and Du, as well as in Spanish newspapers and magazines including El País. Hara photographed exclusively in black and white until 1985, after which he shifted entirely to color. Over the course of his career, he has released multiple photobooks. He currently resides in a small rural village near Cuenca.
