Constanza Mazzotti Peninsula 360 Press [P360P].
Maria Paula Martinez started working as a freelance photographer professionally for Photographers Without Borders in 2018.
Since then, under his lens, he has seen endless landscapes from the mountains of Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl as well as the depths of the Mexican and American seas and faces as far away as those seen in his portraits taken in communities in Africa, Mongolia, Ukraine, Armenia, all of a humanitarian nature. Several of his projects are made for humanitarian aid purposes.
However, in early 2020 and due to the global Covid-19 pandemic, Maria Paula had to stop all her projects in Central America, she thought it would be a quiet time documenting maritime life in Baja California until May when she decided to enter ten Covid hospitals in Mexico City to document the pandemic we all know about.
María Paula's original goal was to portray the medical and cleaning staff who are on the front line of the virus in public hospitals such as Nutrición, Hospital Manuel Gea González, Hospital Juárez, Hospital Primero de Octubre, Hospital 20 de Noviembre, Instituto de Cancerología, Instituto Nacional de Enfermedades Respiratorias (INER), Instituto Nacional de Perinatología, Centro Médico City Banamex and Hospital ABC.
Gradually coverage began to include some of the patients fighting for their lives in hospital beds and began to cover the areas of intensive care, pathology, emergency, operating rooms and labor and delivery.
In this way, dressed in medical protective suits, mask and googles, she covered the pandemic day after day for more than twelve hours without a break.
He witnessed heartbreaking scenes between doctors, sick people and a virus circulating everywhere.
Throughout more than thirty interviews with medical personnel and more than three hundred photographs, he decided to edit and compile the most representative material in a publication entitled "Pandemic" in order to make visible and raise awareness among the population about the work and risks suffered by medical personnel due to a virus whose behavior and total knowledge remains a worldwide mystery.
Proceeds generated from the sale of the book will be donated 50% to the INER hospital.
María Paula is currently editing her second book entitled "Women in the face of the pandemic".
You can buy the book at the following link:
To all of you who are hard at work on the front lines of COVID-19, thank you.
IG @maripomartini
