jaque

"Jaque" (Check): genesis of the essay

July 2nd, 2008. On this day, I was on a work mission, in the city of Recife, state of Pernambuco, northeastern Brazil. My job finished, I was riding a taxi to the airport to return to Rio de Janeiro, the city where I used to work. During the trip, and within a five minute interval from each other, I received two text messages, one from my wife, the other from my brother. Both were almost exactly worded: “Ingrid Betancourt has been rescued!!”. I shouted to the top of my voice “Viva Colombia!!!” and immediately asked the nordestino cabdriver to please urgently tune in to a news station, but he was only able to find an evangelist programme. As soon as I arrived at the airport, I desperately searched for a TV. The following day, the Bogotan newspaper El Tiempo said: “People celebrated the rescue of the kidnapped and ran to the streets to look for a TV”. I decided I had to photograph that historic moment of Freedom, and did so from the only possible place: through the TV set in my hotel room in Copacabana. It was an unforgettable day. A day of joy for Freedom. "Jaque" was exhibited as an installation at the Museo Nacional de Artes Visuales of Montevideo, Uruguay, as part of the 53th National Salon of Visual Arts (2008). "…Éste es un momento muy duro para mí. …Piden pruebas de supervivencia a quemarropa… y aquí estoy escribiéndote mi alma tendida sobre este papel. …la vida aquí no es vida… es un desperdicio lúgubre de tiempo… Tengo una repisa donde pongo mi equipo, es decir, el morral con la ropa y la Biblia que es mi único lujo… Todo listo para salir corriendo. Aquí nada es propio, nada dura, la incertidumbre y la precariedad son la única constante." Letter of Ingrid Betancourt to her mother.