Category: Europe
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Ransdorp
Ransdorp A thousand years ago there were already people living in this low lying Waterland near the Zuyder Zee. Because of regular flooding a long dike was made in the 13th century around the whole Waterland area to protect the fields and villages. Early 16th century the village of Ransdorp started the construction of its…
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Waterland
Waterland I took these pictures in the summer of 2017, but 50 years ago I already cycled on nice summer days to Waterland, this low lying country of meadows, brooks and tiny villages just outside the centre of Amsterdam. Then and now, it cannot be much different from how it was hundred years ago when…
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Camera in love
Camera in love That was the title given to the exhibition of the work of Ed van der Elsken at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 2017. The woman with the cigarette on the photo is Vali Myers, a bohemian artist who was Van de Elsken’s muse during his stay in Paris in the early…
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Japan unbound
Japan unbound Between 1959 and 1988, photographer Ed van der Elsken visited Japan many times. He once calculated that, taken together, he must have walked the streets of Tokyo and other places with his camera every day for more than two years. And, to his own surprise, during those 750 days of roaming around the…
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Twins of an era
Twins of an era Ed van der Elsken (1925-1990) was a street photographer. Wherever he was, in Amsterdam, Paris or Tokyo, he roamed the streets with his camera for days on end and took pictures of … people. Looking at his pictures at an exhibition of his work in 2017, the atmosphere of the 50s,…
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Béla Tarr and the seventh art
Béla Tarr and the seventh art His last and maybe final film: The Turin Horse (black and white, 146′, 2011). There is inside and outside. Outside: a deafening storm rages over the barren land. The gale blows clouds of sand and dead leaves in the air. A desolate bare tree stands on the hill in…
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Art with a wink
Art with a wink One girl is looking intently at the other, and vice versa. They are both completely fascinated by the sight of the other.I remember having, a long time ago, a booklet intended to be humorous, entitled ‘Art with a wink’, with a winking Mona Lisa on the cover.Here, it is not the…
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Model backs
Model backs Lovely loose hanging hair. An equally lovely loose hanging little dress, revealing a beautiful, delicate back. Don’t turn round angels, you may break the enchantment! A village woman from the hills. Her bare lower back betrays a slender waist and sinuous, strong body. As an animal in the wild. And then, a woman’s…
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Tamata
Tamata τάματα is the Greek word for vows and votive offerings, referring to a popular practice among the faithful of most if not all religions. I have shown and written about this fascinating phenomenon earlier on this blog in a series of posts dedicated to the local Hindu god Golu Devta in Kumaon, India, and the…
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Ossuarium
Ossuarium In one of the orthodox churches of Paleochora I saw to my surprise a big open stone reservoir filled with human bones: an ossuary inside the church in full view! I have understood that ossuaries came into use in places where graveyard space is scarce. After a few years in the ground the remains…
