Today we’d like to introduce you to Juan Carlos Castro.
Hi Juan Carlos, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
My story has just started because I moved to Ohio 3 months ago. I was born and raised in a small town in Spain (Velilla del Río Carrión). There, I studied journalism and discovered photography, which was something that I tried to keep as a hobby because I didn’t want a job in photography to make my passion tedious and humdrum.
While I was studying my first year of journalism, I met my now fiancee. She is from Maryland and she was doing an exchange program in her last year of high school. We exchanged Facebooks (in the way that Baby Boomers used to exchange addresses/phone numbers). Our goal was practicing Spanish and English, but 4 years ago we started dating long distance. Now, ten years later, she works in Cincinnati and I moved here to be with her by way of a K-1 visa (basically 90-day fiancee, but without a camera filming you all the time).
Back home in Spain, I worked in big data and I tried to ‘matar el gusanillo’ (be a fly on the wall) with journalism by writing and taking pictures for my Instagram account, @WonkyGuy, and managing some companies´ social accounts. I have been finding any opportunity to continue my photography passion and update my IG account ever since.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Like for any other young person in the world, life is not a bed of roses. You have to be studying, learning and training yourself all the time. I thought I was going to be journalist. I wanted to be doing interviews, taking pictures, and writing articles, but I ended up in a country where the main language is not my mother tongue.
Despite that, I can’t deny that the process is nice, because after every struggle, there is something to learn. I don’t want to sound like the lead of a motivational speech, but even though it is tough, and at some points, you can feel lost, there is always an answer, but sometimes it is not an easy one.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I really like to take pictures with a story. Sometimes it can be a landscape, something that evokes a moment or a feeling. Other times, it can be a macro picture or a street photo where you can see those small, everyday things that are happening, but that you never pay attention to. When I post something on Instagram, I look at the picture I want to post for a while and after that, I write a small story of what it makes me think. Instagram is a platform where you can see some amazing pictures, but most of the time we scroll through them double tapping on most of them, but not paying attention. We can see the next Pulitzer price, double tap and forget about it.
I like when people post a comment or message me about the story, even when they say that the story is not related with the picture, because in that way I can see that they had to take their time evaluating the photo and they are forming their own opinion about what the picture means to them, or what story it evokes for them.
What has been the most important lesson you’ve learned along your journey?
If there is something you are interested in pursuing, see if you can do it and try it. I lost some opportunities because I was waiting for a better moment or because I thought I was not ready or worthy because some people might do it better. When we are talking about perspectives, they are different, not better.
Contact Info:
- Email: juancarloscastro1306@gmail.com
- Website: https://juancarloscastro.myportfolio.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wonkyguy/?hl=es
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JuanCCastroS
Image Credits
JC Castro
