I had the fun time of going over to Helens place to do a new shoot in her studio and dress up in the cosplay costume i got in Japan on my recent trip…..
Im still working through the shots so only one little one for now but many more to come…..
Another fun photographic thing i did was to get a few redbubblers together and have a bit of fun in The Botanical gardens with plastic cameras… Jo Obrien, James Price, PurelyDecorative, Jenny Hall met me and we divied up the cameras….
There was alot to choose from, Jenny was playing with the Lomo action sampler ,Purelydecorative was playing with her own Holga, Jo was playing with her 600 Polaroid and her shots are great, digital may have a small screen to view the images instantly but holding a Polaroid and watching the image come out is magic… James played with my Lensbaby and I had a play with everything else…. I played with the 35mm pinhole that I got in Japan, my hubbies lomo fisheye and I even tried a bit of TTV with my brownie reflex, PHEW thats alot of different cameras….
TTV pic of James, Jo, PD, and Jenny…. I still hevnet played too much witht he images but that is what weekends are for….. a preview..
When I was on my trip i wanted to collect some interesting cameras but only managed to get one, and that one i had to assemble myself.
In Tokyo I went to the “Tokyo Metropolitan museum of Photography” and saw a fantastic retrospective of the Japanese photographer Moriyama Daido. It was fantastic to see how an artist views there own home and I loved his vision of Japan. And like in all good museums one of the most exciting things is the museum shop…. There was many cool and interesting things but i saw a flatpac camera called a P-Sharan (this is the US site because the Japanese one is terrible and isnt translated)
I wasn’t feeling great over the weekend so pumped up the heater and put on one of my favorite japanese animations Totoro
its super cute and just makes me feel good….
The camera wasn’t difficult but with only Japaneses instructions it took a little working out…. but by the end of the film i had a fully functioning pinhole camera….. stay tuned for the test shots…..
Well we are back home but I didnt get around to putting anything up of the last part of our trip….
Sorry about the last post but the crazy russian keyboard and my “scrambled by seeing too much art” brain didnt really make too much sense….
we went from Prague to Berlin then to Latvia from there to St Petersburg, Helsinki then home….
Berlin was great full of wonderful contempory art and unbelievable history, i left with 4 pairs of shoes and a true love of the place…. Latvia is still sinking in and then Russia and crazy St Petersburg. St Petersburg is jsut big it is full of big buildings, huge wide streets, huge churches and everything ornate and impressive, even though they are very run down… The Hermitage was incredible so much art and so ornate its hard to believe people actually lived there… Helsinki was great, the people super friendly and so full of great graphic design…
We got home after 22hrs adn 2 planes and a run in between to get home to reality… it was a hard comedown but I have alot of things to work on… im so full of insperation for new artwork i dont know where to start…
and another great thing is i found out that i sold the artwork i had in the Brunswick st gallery just after i left… YAY
im writing this from a cafe inside the hermitage in st petersburg in russia….. OMG….. is is totall crazy and beautiful…. to much to write now but i a strange thing to be able to do…….
wow i have spent a few days in Riga the capital of latvia and where my father was born….. it was a strange feeling seeing people who looked like my family but not understand the language. we visited the occupation museum and i now have so much more of an insight as to why my grandmother was the way she was…. it will take a little while to digest the exprience…..
we are at the riga airport waiting for our flight to st petersburg which is very exciting…. only a few more days left of our amasing journey and i want more…..
we have been through a few countries now, Slovenia was wonderful the people super nice. the country is full of forests and is so green. we had a few nights in its capital then spent a night in the town of bled. bled is beautiful and even though it was raining it was stunning with a church on a small island in the middle of the lake. Slovenians love a brew, we have seen them drinking beer, young and old, at 7 in the morning with there coffee…. from slovenia we got abeautiful train ride to croatia and then a flight tothe town of split on the coast. we arrived at night and where hit with so many old ladies asking if we needed accomadation… this was a trend for the whole of croatia. we saw more roman ruins and happened apon a dance group one night doing tango in teh ruins, it was fantastic. from split a catamaran to hvar, it is sooo beautiful and we ate the most awsome seafood. then to dubrovnik, what a fantastic city with so much history and beauty. we are now in prague, for another day then to berlin……
sorry my entries have been very slow but finding internet in italy isnt easy….
Rome was <great and i have to say we where spoilt after the vatican museums that other things jsut lost a bit of there wow factor…. after rome came the amalfi coast….. what a difference after stone and relics it was sun and colour…. we caught hte train to naples…what a dive….. then a ferry to positano…. it was stunning all the colour on the cliffs was fantastic, it totally amaysed me how they could get all teh buildings up so high on he cliffs right on the edge… we had a stunning view from our room. We paid to sit on the beach but it ws totally worth it because we got to sit on candy coloured deckchairs and drink beer… the sand was black and hot but hte water cold and refreshing… it really feels like a real honeymoon now….. from positano a realy adventure started….
to get to san gimignano we had to take 2buses and 4 trains…. so much for big tourist spot???? it was crazy but totally worth it and after all the travel we arrived in tuscany…. it looks just like a painting with rolling hills and beautiful little farmhouses dotted amongst hte vines… the town is a walled city with towers and was jsut the most beautiful place to wander and through….. we did a wine tour to a smal local vinyard and now i understand all teh fuss about hte reagion, its definatlly not cheap lambrussco…..
from there a short bus to florence…. what a beautiful place, it instantly felt comfortable, shane felt it too. we went to our room which from teh window was a view of the duomo and then to see david…. wow what a wonderful masterpiece….. we met up with shanes friend who just happened to be on a holiday tour and intersected ours that night and went to a very cheesy night club fullof people on contiki tours but it was fun dancing and listening to bad karaoke…. we got up early the next day to line up for the uffizi gallery…. we where at the start of hte line and after only a 45min wait for the doors to open they let us in to see totally wonderful masterpieces….
<from florence to venice….. i think in its hayday venice would have beena incredable sight to see but it was a bit rundown and tourist overrun…. it was beautiful though especially when the light started to drop at night and we had a wonderful view of the canel from our room window…
we hopped train to trieste and then a bus to slovenia yesterday so we are now in another country for hte crazy part of hte trip to begin…. from here another 5 countries and 9 cities before home….
