In a way, graffiti and murals always seem to boil down to saying: “Hey! I exist!” I found these walking around in Dijon, partly in dark and dirty alleys – that’s why I decided not to enhance the light here.
Tag: Urban Exploration
Rubbish
A Shiny Package
As the days get shorter and the weather generally takes a turn for the worse, it sems that the little souces of light – albeit reflected light – become more conspicuous. | A contribution for this week’s Photo Challenge.
Shine: The Importance of Being Pretty
Just another contribution for this week’s Photo Challenge.
Graffiti Details
Photographing Graffiti: trying to turn pictures into pictures. The walls of Blankenese Lighthouse (Hamburg) were covered with layers of graffiti (‘gone over’). Framing parts of them into new pictures seemed to make sense … trying to bring to light whatever meaning the details might contain. [Jen, thanks for the Weekly Photo Challenge.]
Random Hamburg
Hello … My Name is … YOR7
Looking for traces of use and abuse around Wiesbaden’s former courthouse, I spotted these pictures painted on metal doors. I found them absolutely gripping, and immediately decided I had to show them to Jörg from Dosenkunst. Then I checked with his blog and found out he had photographed and posted them quite a while ago. So what was the point of photographing them again?
I told my wife I had to show her some photos of graffiti, and upon seeing them she replied: “Are you sure you want to call these graffiti? They are art!” So here’s another interpretation of art…
Celles
There is a Mairie, a mayor’s office where the notices on the board look new, and a church that appears well maintained. But the houses around the two buildings are crumpling, some roofs have already caved in, some walls have come down. People left some 50 years ago when the Salagou river was dammed to form Lac du Salagou. The inhabitants were compensated and moved to other places because once the water was there the village would not. But someone apparently had not done their maths, and now Celles is by the water rather than under it: A ghost town most beautifully situated at the lake shore.
Celles was one of the first places we visited when we were in France. And it might have been here that I had a hunch I should photograph traces: In this abandoned village you could not really be sure which trace was left at what time. The pictures seem to evoke a sense of chronology: When did the blue rope in the fourth photo enter the picture?
This is my contribution for Paleica’s Magic Letters: V – Verlassen, verloren, vergessen [Left, lost, forgotten].
Le bonheur dans la rue (I)
…and some more patterns for Paula – from a shop offering vintage clothes where I always find fancy things I can photograph, right in the street.
2/3. Doors
More Metal for Paleica
In my eyes, metal is one of the most fascinating materials (along with stone, wood, and glass): Different metals allow for different uses, display different grades of lustre, and corrode differently if at all. So Paleica’s photo challenge is a welcome occasion, although I feel I’ve already posted loads of “Metall.”
2/3. Vertical (Part Two)
Since I have quite a bit of metal for you today – even in the second picture – I thought this might also be an appropriate entry for Paleca’s Magic Letters Challenge: The magic word is Metall.
2/3. Geology? Archaeology?
A quick reminder because I love getting myself distracted by photo challenges: The 2/3 series features a simple formula: composition by the so called rule of thirds. The idea is to focus on structures and colours rather than composition while giving the pictures a uniform look. Based on this unifying ‘grammar’ it should be possible to arrange and re-arrange picture series according to different criteria – and tell different ‘stories’ – without losing a certain coherence. Here, the story told might be of rocks, or the remnants enclosed inside them.
Come In!
Getting these pictures ready to be published, I just realized that the light is kind of special in all three of them (little light as there might be). So I guess this might as well be an entry for Paleica’s Magic Letter Challenge: Licht / Light.
Way Home
This is what I see on my way, some of it in my way (by the way).
A Short Walk Around Luxemburgplatz
Luxemburgplatz: There is a distinct neighbourhood surrounding this little downtown square, and since I do not know it well, I enjoyed walking around there, making pictures. While this post shows what can happen when I take a camera, I am not quite sure if pictures like these are what Jo has in mind for her Monday Walks. But I think that although they show nothing but details, they convey that particular neighbourhood’s atmosphere.
Kurhaus III
Traces of the Past
Traces from a past when these were, strictly speaking, already traces from the past: Classicism was quite the thing when these buildings were erected roughly 150 years ago. I am fascinated by the ways the builders found around traditional – probably expensive – masonry: Mostly brick and cast iron and occasionally some wood were the materials used instead.
This is my (late) contribution for Paula’s Thursday’s Special which is really worth a visit.
2/3. Graffiti
Some graffiti I found looking for simple compositions. If you really like great graffiti and mural art, I strongly recommend a visit at Dosenkunst (‘Canned Art’).
The Changing Seasons: Downtown in April
These pictures were taken in the mornings of April 8th till 10th – on my way to work again – except for the last one which shows the chair in front of an ice cream parlor in the late afternoon sun. I supposed that in comparison to the last Changing Seasons post the light would not have changed much since we went back do daylight saving time in the end of March. The weather was much nicer though, and with it, the light possibly a little warmer.
This is a contribution for Cardinal Guzman’s ongoing Changing Seasons project, which you should check out if you have the time. It will take you all around the world.
empire of lights 