The following guest post by Adam M. Silvia, Curator of Photography in the Prints & Photographs Division, is based on his interview with Armando Arorizo on September 26th, 2025.
Earlier this year, the Library of Congress acquired a portfolio of 32 photographs by Armando Arorizo documenting the National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) at California Speedway in Fontana, California in 1999-2001. The portfolio includes 10 panoramas, 12 standard-frame photographs, two quadriptychs (each a work composed of four photographs) and a contact sheet (pictured above). The panoramas build upon the previously acquired Armando Arorizo Photograph Collection, which contains an additional 65 panoramas covering a wide variety of subjects: working class Americans, various sports, political leaders, Hollywood celebrities, and the Latino community in Los Angeles. Eager to learn more about his photos at the Library, we asked Arorizo about his journey as a photographer, his dedication to the panoramic format, and its application to various kinds of journalism, beginning with sports photography and NASCAR specifically.
In 1999, “I was working [freelance] for the [Los Angeles] Times,” says Arorizo, when he photographed California 500 presented by the National Automotive Parts Association (NAPA). “A friend of mine [Jon SooHoo] was the [track] photographer and would hire [others] to help.” Happy to work for him, Arorizo noticed “they had a panoramic camera, but nobody liked to use it, because it was a little different and more challenging than a regular camera.” Arorizo asked SooHoo, “Why don’t you let me shoot it?”
SooHoo was surprised. The hulking body of the Fujica Panorama G617 weighed three pounds with a 105 mm lens. Unfortunately, “a tripod would be impossible,” explains Arorizo, because “everything [in NASCAR] moves really fast,” and the Fujica was already slow enough. “It’s a fully manual camera,” says Arorizo, and you couldn’t increase the shutter speed beyond 1/500th of a second, because the negative or transparency was 6×17 cm and required a lot of light. Also, SooHoo gave him Provia 100, a transparency stock that was slower than color negative film.
Unable to freeze the cars in motion, Arorizo adjusted to the limitations of the camera by instead photographing the audience, the midway outside the stadium, the pits, and the infield and garage area inside the track. “This is a good example,” says Arorizo, pointing to his photograph of Steve Park, driver of the Pennzoil #1 Chevrolet at California Speedway in 2001. “This was in the garage [area],” where “they were putting the car down” from the trailer. The panoramic format complements the length of the trailer and the ramp, and the transparency film truly shines. “The yellow, the black, and the blue of the sky was really perfect,” Arorizo remarks. “NASCAR is so colorful: the cars, the logos, the whole thing.”
Photographing NASCAR was a unique experience. “Oh man, the noise… even with the earplugs,” Arorizo remembers. “I wasn’t ready for that…. When the race begins, [and] all the [drivers] start their engines, it’s so loud that you feel it. You hear it, but you also feel it [throughout] your body.” Documenting the pits was especially intense. “You’re so close that you smell the fumes,” he recalls. “All your clothes smell like gasoline.” Commenting on his panorama of a pitstop by Dale Earnhardt, Jr., driver of the Budweiser #8 Chevrolet, Arorizo explains, “You want a good picture, so you [need] to be close, but not too close, because you might get hurt.” It was very challenging. “[I] had this big camera and wanted pictures in which everything makes sense,” but “I had to [stay] aware.”
Arorizo had come a long way to Fontana. “I was born and raised in Mexico City,” he explains. “My dad worked in a factory,” and “my mom used to own a pharmacy” where “people brought film [to be processed].” In his teens, he helped load the film into envelopes to mail to the closest Kodak laboratory. “In Mexico, it was very expensive to own a camera,” but Arorizo, now interested in photography, saved up to buy a Pentax. He photographed special occasions, like camping trips, but “I didn’t take that many photos,” he says, because film was costly. Fortunately, “my mom had the pharmacy, [so] I didn’t need to pay to process the film.”
After studying chemical engineering in Mexico City, Arorizo moved to the United States in 1986. Initially, his goal was to study English, so he enrolled in English classes at the Rinaldi Adult Center in Mission Hills, California. “My roommate, from Japan, had a [Yoshica] point-and-shoot camera with [a feature] to create double exposures,” he recalls. They experimented: “We used to drive up Mount Wilson and [make] one [exposure] then go to the city and [make] the other.” Arorizo later enrolled in a photography class at Pierce College in Los Angeles and volunteered at Mark’s Color Lab in Northridge. Mark’s taught him chemistry, developing, printing, dry mounting, and framing; “I [learned] the whole process of photography.” Arorizo was also mentored by one of Mark’s clients, the architectural photographer, Paul Jonason.
In 1992, Arorizo opened a photo studio in Northridge, where he made passport photos, but he was increasingly drawn to photojournalism. “I went to see Jorge Irribarren [staff artist for the L.A. Daily News] and was amazed by all the computers [in the newsroom].” There, he met David Montesino, a “complete guy,” an artist, like Irribarren, but also a photographer. “He knew so much,” says Arorizo. “We starting [covering] sports. He taught me about the newspaper [business].” In 1995, Arorizo moved his studio to Boyle Heights, close to Downtown Los Angeles, where the county hired him to document the construction of the L.A. Metro. “I got really involved with the local community,” says Arorizo; he especially liked photographing the mariachis who gathered nearby.
One day, while photographing the mariachis, Arorizo made a connection that led him to Javier Rojas, who edited the Spanish edition of the Los Angeles Times. Rojas hired Arorizo as a staff photographer. “Seeing my photos on the front page was pretty cool,” says Arorizo, who also began freelancing for the English edition. Arorizo left the Spanish edition in 1996 but remained close with Rojas. In 1998, he and Rojas purchased a commercial studio in Koreatown named the Perfect Exposure; they kept the name but changed its specialization to photojournalism, displaying news photos on the walls. “We became very popular,” states Arorizo. “I’ll be working and six or seven photographers will show up, wanting to hang out.” He enjoyed mentoring students, much like Jonason and Montesino had mentored him.
Arorizo also practiced his own photography. In 2005, his friend, photographer Aurelia Ventura, lent him a Hasselblad XPan, a small format camera with a knob on the back to switch between standard and panoramic frame. The first time he used it was to photograph the funeral of Pope John Paul II. “A lot of people bought this camera thinking they would like it,” but in actuality, “they hated it,” says Arorizo, “because they didn’t get the results they expected.” Initially, “it’s like, oh man, that doesn’t look right,” but “like everything else in photography, you need to keep practicing.” Arorizo eventually purchased his own and brought it on assignments along with his digital camera. “I would always take two or three photos with [the XPan],” simply “because I like the format. I like how it looks, and I like the challenge.”
Arorizo reached for the XPan when he wanted to convey a sense of magnitude. There is less distortion than exposing a standard frame using a wide-angle lens, he explains, so “you feel like you’re there,” looking with your own two eyes. For example, Arorizo photographed Lakers stars Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol, displaying the length of their arms, which take up the majority of the frame. “I asked them who had the wider wingspan,” recalls Arorizo. Kobe laughed, “by far [Pau]!”
The panoramic format could also have the opposite effect. In 2010, Arorizo photographed Galaxy star David Beckham, standing alone on the field after his team’s loss to FC Dallas. “He was [disappointed] watching [Dallas] celebrate,” says Arorizo. “He’s the only Galaxy [player] out there. Everyone else had already left.” The emptiness of the wide frame communicates what Beckham may have been feeling in that moment.
Arorizo applied the same technique to convey the isolation endured by a utility worker fixing a water pipe below ground in Sunland, California. In 2016, Arorizo was hired by the Local 18 Department of Water and Power Workers to document union members on the job. “[One guy] asked me, ‘Are you claustrophobic?’” Arorizo replied, “I don’t think so.” They crawled “30 yards down” into a pipe that “was only 60 inches wide.” It was pitch black except for a utility light and sparks that rained down onto the worker’s helmet. Arorizo used the XPan to convey the feeling that you’re inside the pipe, surrounded by darkness. Similarly, Arorizo utilized dark space in his photo of the mariachis, above, to give you the sense that you’re at the Santa Cecilia Festival, surrounded by a crowd.
The wide, panoramic format, however, can also convey feelings of solidarity and togetherness. Beginning in the early 2000s, Arorizo worked assignments for the United States Department of Labor. In 2016, he photographed Secretary of Labor Tom Perez discussing paid family leave with a woman named Guadalupe Salazar in a restaurant in Palo Alto, California. “[Perez] wanted to know about [her experience] and how he could make it better,” explains Arorizo, who snapped the photo with his XPan then quickly backed away to give them privacy. “The photo is very intimate,” says Arorizo. The long, rectangular shape of the panorama perfectly frames the line of sight connecting Perez and Salazar. “It was a really nice moment between them.”
Based in Los Angeles, Arorizo had numerous opportunities to photograph Hollywood celebrities and star athletes, yet many of his panoramas include ordinary working people, like Salazar. “I treat everyone the same, with dignity and respect,” he explains. A panorama is special, perhaps because it’s larger than a standard photograph, or because it’s more costly to produce and less common; it conveys respect. Arorizo, thankful to family and friends, photographed them in panoramic format, too. One photograph depicts his daughter, Francine, riding Inkie’s Frog Hopper on the Santa Monica Pier. Another depicts the Dodgers honoring the team’s photographer, Jon SooHoo. “He’s one of those guys who always helped me,” says Arorizo.
The Prints & Photographs Division thanks Armando Arorizo for giving this interview and contributing his panoramas to the Library’s photojournalism collections. We invite researchers to view more of his photographs by making an appointment to visit the Prints & Photographs Reading Room.
Learn More:
- Browse over 4,300 panoramas by other photographers dating from 1851 to 1991.
- Learn more about the Library’s photojournalism collections by consulting our research guide on photojournalism.
Comments
Enjoyed the extended format.