During his Caltrain commute from Gilroy to Palo Alto, Spencer Enriquez usually covers his face with his beanie to get some shut-eye before clocking into his day job as a graphic designer. From my personal observations as a fellow Caltrain commuter, he’s not alone.
Most commuters zone out with their headphones on, responding to emails, sitting through morning meetings or gazing out the window.
But at the beginning of this year, Enriquez had a different agenda for his Caltrain GoPass: use it to capture scenes from the South Bay and up the Peninsula to San Francisco.
“I just thought it’d be fun to utilize my train pass, hit various stops that I wouldn’t normally explore the areas of, and kind of familiarize myself with more of the Bay Area,” Enriquez told KQED.
He’ll showcase his findings at his solo exhibition, Off Track, at San Jose Japantown’s Know Future Gallery, on view May 9–June 6.
For three months, equipped with either his Canon SLR or Olympus 35SP and a backpack filled with snacks and extra film rolls, Enriquez spent his weekends driving up to the San Jose Diridon Caltrain station to embark on a day of exploration.
Some stops were planned — like when Caltrain had an event for Martin Luther King Jr. Day — but most of the time, Enriquez just went off of what was interesting to him.
“By the time I got home after each one, I was pretty beat,” Enriquez said. “I just walked a mile or so out, did loops, walked through neighborhoods, main streets, downtown. I let it go with the flow. Something would catch my eye and draw me in one direction and I would go that way.”
Many of Enriquez’s shots are of blink-and-you’ll-miss-it kind of moments: for example, a photo of an abandoned garage with a broken-down car near the Sunnyvale station. As a Sunnyvale resident myself, I’ve never taken notice of this spot, but it’s a site Enriquez wanted to explore after it caught his eye on his commutes.
While most of Enriquez’s collection of photos focuses on just that — the small, everyday scenes we might not give a second glance as we gaze out the window — he also shows some tender moments of connection.
In one photo, we see a couple sitting down on a bench at a Caltrain stop, turned towards each other and holding hands. It’s a heartfelt moment that works to contrast the digital dependency often found in public transportation — people all connected online, but not to each other.
