Francisco Guerrero (b. 1975) is a Spanish- Filipino freelance photographer. During college at Brooks Institute of Photography in California, he became the recipient of the American Photo Photojournalism Award, and was sent to West Africa for their school’s documentary program. Guerrero has worked with several renowned photographers such as Luca Tettoni, S.C Shekar at the Hansa Visuals studio in Kuala Lumpur and Eddie Adams Barnstorm for a number of workshops in New York. In 2002, after graduating from Goldsmith’s College in London with a second degree in Anthropology and Communications, he launched Redbench inSpain, a studio shared with Mark Gregory Peters and Susann Gellida.  Known for his commercial and fashion success, Guerrero’s works have been published in numerous local and international magazines, such as New York Times Travel, Marie Claire, Destinasian, GQ, Town & Country, Runner’s World and Rogue.

ARTIST STATEMENT:

What appears to be Rizal’s documented need for romantic adventures and the years he spent traveling through Europe it seems to me that his life of self appointed “exile” speaks to deeper parts of his character, that of a intellectual voyeur and romantic traveller. This image of Rizal in Buen Retiro echoes the images of voyeur’s who hide and watch lovers in the parks of Europe. But Rizal was not watching lovers, instead his travels through Europe allowed him to watch the colonizing powers of his day. And like all voyeurs, it is only while observing that the imagination is sparked. Once Rizal was home and his ideas and ideals were taken into the realm of the political Filipino reality of the time the spell was soon broken. The voyeur thrown into the reality of contact and proximity is no longer able to have the physical space of separation that defines him. This is the Rizal transformed into hero, of martyr loosing his position of observer only to become observed, metaphorically depicted in the series Bandera. We have become the voyeurs, watching Rizal’s life from historic distance, a space allowing us to create a character more of our imagination than of his reality. – Francisco Guerrero

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