Chavos

What’s it like to be a young man? That crazy time in our lives when we’re finding our place in the world, and many of us seem to run a little wild. Most come out the other side. We settle down, find jobs, and start families. There are always a few who struggle to end the party, and then we sometimes have friends who don’t make it through. This work touches on that journey. It’s about young men known collectively as Los Chavos Banda. People coming of age in the low-income neighbourhoods of the city of Monterrey, Mexico, but doing so when the city was experiencing the worst levels of organised crime it had ever known. Two criminal groups were fighting over the metropolis and the illicit trade that flowed through it. This disturbing violence moves around the country in waves, concentrating itself in certain places for certain periods of time. It’s a situation that disproportionately affects young males, and has its greatest impact on the less-privileged side of society. I started taking these images in 2011, and over three years I kept returning. I encountered young men with all the energy and aspiration you’d expect for people of their age, but in a context of high inequality with few opportunities for quality education or well-paid stable work. There was laughing and partying, some boredom and frustration, bits of anger and fighting, alongside the predictable family difficulties and social problems. Then there was the grief and trauma as organised crime and violence punctuated people’s lives. Some people got caught up in the crime. In the social and economic context they’re susceptible, seeing it as a way to earn money and status. Others existed on its edges as consumers; vulnerable to being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most wanted nothing to do with it. Nonetheless, everyone had to live with the fear and the long-term consequences of losing friends and family members.