At 7:51 That Morning

While living in Mexico City, I often went out walking with my camera.

That morning, the Torre Latinoamericana stood out above everything around it.

That was what first caught my attention.

I wanted the tower, but I also wanted a frame.

The trees gave me one.

I positioned myself so that the foliage surrounded the tower while leaving enough open sky for it to rise through the center of the photograph.

Then there was the clock.

07:51:23.

The time mattered to me because I was out that morning doing exactly what I enjoyed doing: walking through the city with my camera and paying attention to what appeared in front of me.

I was documenting my moment.

The tower was part of Mexico City.

But for that morning, from that particular place beneath the trees, this was my view of it.

At 7:51 That Morning presents the Torre Latinoamericana rising above the surrounding architecture of Mexico City and framed by mature trees.

The tower is positioned within an opening created deliberately through the surrounding foliage. Darker branches and leaves occupy the perimeter while the lighter overcast sky provides separation behind the building and its antenna.

Smaller structures retained at the bottom of the composition establish the tower's relationship to the surrounding city and reinforce the prominence that originally attracted Colón's attention.

The illuminated clock reading 07:51:23 provides an additional temporal element within the photographed scene.

The clock should not be interpreted as a verified exposure timestamp. Camera metadata records the exposure on October 20, 2018 at 8:43:42 AM. The Studio preserves both pieces of information without attempting to reconcile the difference.

For Colón, the visible time remains significant because it belongs to his memory of being out that morning with his camera, documenting the city through observation rather than pursuing a predetermined photograph.

There does not have to be a complicated meaning behind every photograph.

Sometimes it is enough to remember where you were and what made you stop.

I was out that morning with my camera.

I saw the Torre Latinoamericana rising above everything around it.

I saw the trees.

I realized they could become the frame.

And I made the photograph.

Looking at it now, the clock gives the picture something unusual.

07:51:23 remains illuminated on the building inside a photograph made years ago.

The camera metadata and the clock do not agree on the exact time, and I do not need to force them to.

What matters to me is simpler.

The photograph remembers the morning.

It remembers where I was looking.

And it remembers what I saw.

Years later, I can stand in front of the photograph and look through those trees again.

Preserved as the one hundred forty-fourth accessioned photograph in the Francisco Colón Studio Photography Wing, At 7:51 That Morning was made in Mexico City, Mexico, on October 20, 2018.

The photograph depicts the Torre Latinoamericana, one of Mexico City's most recognizable architectural landmarks, rising above neighboring structures and framed by surrounding foliage.

Colón's original intention was twofold: to photograph the prominence of the tower within the surrounding city and to use the trees as a deliberate natural frame.

The illuminated clock displaying 07:51:23 became an additional record within the scene and contributes to Colón's recollection of documenting his morning walk with the camera.

The camera's EXIF metadata records the exposure at 8:43:42 AM. Because the reason for the difference between the camera time and the tower clock cannot be established from the photograph alone, the Studio record preserves both rather than assigning an unsupported explanation.

Within the archive, the work represents a straightforward form of personal observation: a recognizable landmark photographed not simply as architecture, but as it appeared to the photographer from one particular position during one particular morning.