Dominican photographer Pedro (Pedrito) Guzmán Bencosme passed away on Tuesday, 21 March 2023 at the Centro Medico UCE in Santo Domingo after suffering from bone cancer. He was 63 years old.
He had moved from Santo Domingo to live permanently in Punta Cana with his wife, Ilana Benady decades ago. Benady for years was a news writer and editor of the DR1 News.
Guzman is survived by his wife Ilana and his son Lucas Samuel, who studies photography and communications in Brussels, Belgium.
Guzman served as photographer to Jose Francisco Peña Gómez, political leader of the Dominican Revolutionary Party, former Santo Domingo mayor and presidential candidate. In 2000, President Hipolito Mejía hired him as his official presidential photographer. His high-quality photographs set a new standard for covering the Presidency that Mejía’s successors have followed. Guzman is recognized as one of the founders of the Dominican Journalists Association (Colegio Domingo de Periodistas), the local journalist guild.
Guzman began his career as a photojournalist in 1976 at the El Nacional de Ahora newspaper. He also worked at El Sol, Hoy and El Nuevo Diario.
He served as a freelance war correspondent in Central America for several international news agencies, including Univisión, Notimex and ANN. He worked on several organizations covering events for the United Nations, Organization of American States, Oxfam GB, Helvetas, GTZ and others.
His work as a photojournalist would evolve to artistic levels. He has participated in dozens of individual and collective exhibitions. and his photography of nature and life around the country can be found in many homes around the country.
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El Dia
Hoy
22 March 2023