Paying Homage to Photographer Ricardo Mata

This morning two photo clubs, Antigua’s and Guatemala’s, got together at Casa Santo Domingo to pay homage to photographer Ricardo Mata who about 54 years ago called on 10 of his colleagues to form the first photo club of Guatemala.

It was a rare opportunity to see members of both photo clubs at one place to share our passion for photography and to pay a tribute to Guatemala’s most prolific photographer and world traveler. He shared with us this morning that he had travel and photographed 94 countries. I regret not procuring a copy of a thorough biographical sketch by writer and long-time friend Carmen Matute of Ricardo Mata. Heck, even Ricardo Mata declared he would love to have a copy of the biographical sketch since he said there were more information there than what he has available in his own archives. Talking about archive, Ricardo Mata’s photo archive is in the millions of images, most of them slides. See the video below to take a peek at his archives.

The Club Fotográfico de Guatemala also held its monthly photo contest and I had the honor to be one of the judges. All in all, it was awesome feel-good event; the kind that you never read about in the news, but happen very often in Guatemala.

Here’s a video of Ricardo Mata narrating how the funded Guatemala’s first photo club thanks Nelo Mijangos.

Here’s the video invitation for the tribute to Ricardo Mata prepared by Club Fotográfico de Guatemala.

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