8 All Roads Lead to Mercato
David Sears, text and photos
My first job was shooting pictures of UNICEF's WIBS programs - they kindly allowed me to keep the b&w film (Ilford). I shot Fujichrome in 1996 and '97, then got a good deal on Kodachrome through '97-8.
By 1999, I'd gone native, having had some vague notion of moral obligation to buy my film (Kodacolor Gold) off local shelves, and process it locally... yeah, well, sometimes a great notion. Thus, the images produced in this latter era (the clothes market), the blanco-y-negro, and the occasional E-6, uniquely represent their subjects: filled with blemishes and exotic variances in relative color values.
Camera was primarily Leica M.
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The flower of youth
Images in this presentation were made from spring 1996 through mid-1999, when I lived in Addis Ababa; my wife, a Danish doctor, had taken a job as a WHO program administrator, and her "dependent spouse" picked up contract work as "communications consultant" to UN agencies and NGOs.
< Amanda, age 3-3/4
This reportage on mercato could not have been possible without my very good friend, Assefa Gezaw, who always had my back.
Greetings Asselefech and Assefa!