bigpicture

One morning I woke up in a hotel room, the fresh morning light was beaming through the blinds. I have always been a morning person. In the morning life is still at peace, Soon it starts getting busy and complicated. Each morning is a fresh beginning to me. The outlook to start a new day is exciting, usually more exciting than what the day will actually turn out to be; but I still get light-hearted every time and get out of bed quickly so that I do not miss anything of today

Today coming home from an easy going Saturday: The lift had just stopped. The doors opened with their usual ping. A wave of twilight washed in from the blue hour outside and mixed with the neon tubes inside. I turned and looked into the mirror. For a moment everything was still and in its right place. The light was perfect, a perfect moment.

These are my favourite shoes. This is how they look photographed. They have been going a long way. I bought them in 2005 without thinking too much about it, but now they are ‘mine’ and I do feel quite attached to them. They are the step into my comfort zone before I leave home.
Looking at a seemingly familiar object through a camera reveals it as the eyes are learning to see. A photograph can show me all the details missed before and shed light into the unawareness all-around. Nothing is really ordinary.
I have never been particularly careful with my things and slowly my most favourite shoes are now giving in to the wear and tear – Just like all things eventually do. Only the process gives everything its character leaving marks of inperfections. In German it is even called ‘Zahn der Zeit’ - the tooth of time gnawing away. Worn shoes tell a story. This pair, my pair are telling a bit of my journey and this photograph speaks of the time which is quite literally gone.

I saw an older man eating by himself and wondered if he enjoyed his solitude or suffered from loneliness. To me eating without company is a necessary nourishing process. It is funny because it is regarded bad manners to talk with your mouth full anyway but when we are eating together our chair represents the place we have in each other’s lives.

This corner is not empty. How can a corner be empty? It still contains air. To be precise, we must say the corner is empty of. In a vacuum it would  still contain space and light as well as its own substance. From a physical point of view, the corner is always full of something.
Yet, really this corner is emptiness. It is devoid of any inherent character as it depends on other external circumstances. The wall is not the corner, the floor is not the corner, the ceiling is not the corner even the emptiness does not imply cornerness on its own. This emptiness again is defined by the tables not being in the corner. All these aspects together make this empty corner; If they all exist simultaneously the mind does impute cornerness round the empty space until the combined perception is disrupted. Its physical essence remains elusive. This corner is emptiness.

Finally after 3 months of waiting today I got granted the privilege to buy a brand new Leica M9. After a few ritual dances and careful assembly I took this first picture just as she came home. I have a hard time getting used to the manual operations that now is required again, but I already feel to be at the beginning of new freedom! Focussing, depth in field, exposure – All manual. The control I have always missed leaving behind my F3 for the digital world. The picture feels like 35mm again !
The solid body is engineered to perfection and a dream to hold. I feel like Gollum stroking my precious when I pick it up. The lens seems to take bites from reality even in our dark lobby. Even the laziest and obscured of photons seem to want to get into the Summilux 50mm when the shutter is clicked with understated sophistication. I am learning to see all over again. It all started here with L1000001.DNG

Jodphur is an ancient city in the Indian desert state of Rajasthan. The blue tinge of the whitewashed houses of the Old Town gave the Blue City its second name. In summer the temperature easily get above 40°C, dropping not much below 30°C at night. During the day it felt like walking towards a hairdryer in full blast. I drank about 5 litres of water without going to the toilet once. I, like most people slept on the rooftop trying to get every breath of fresh air cutting through the sticking heat.
The sunrise waking me up very early from shallow sleep I saw the city coming back to life in slow motion. Unknowningly theatrical one after another got up, carefully folded their sarong, tidying their sari and calmly walking down inside like backtracking sleepwalkers.

I was in Qiemo by necessity at the end of a day of travelling the endless bus routes of China’s most western province. Formerly an oasis kingdom along the ancient silk road it now is a nondescript little town on the southeastern rim of the Taklamakan desert where most visitors only see the long-distance bus station. Literally in the heartland of Asia thousands of kilometers away from the sea; winter here is extremly cold.
Minus 20° is the norm. I had arrived late at night. The next morning I was drawn to Qiemos surreal modern center layed out with lavishly oversized roads, as to draw a more conscious line between the urban and one of the largest deserts on Earth. Its majestetic vastness seemed to have poured its emptiness into the town. Enormous sidewalks literally deserted besides untravelled roads. Everything was still as if life itself had frozen I suddenly felt that I was already looking at a photograph. I waited and stared to see what would happen next.
It was one lonely red rickshaw labouring over the icy street. Slowly moving, causing ripples on the surface of my still life.
I captured this moment as the image slipped and life went back to its usual fast forward.

Once in a little town along the Mekong just about 10 kilometers south past the Golden Triangle in northern Thailand. From its tiny port rusty freighters took off for their journey up the Mekong; between Laos and Myanmar to China. Day in day out trucks deliver cargo to be loaded by an endless chain of tireless porters from the ramp into the hull. Mostly crates of Red Bull or boxes of dried dates at the time Strolling round there to hitch a ride on one of the ships myself I noticed two carefully wrapped up buddha statues on the parking lot infront the cargo bay. The picture struck me and so I returned the next day early in the morning when the light was right. I got there just 30min after sunrise and captured this image. The buddha statues were covered in the traditional orange which matched the reflection of the early morning sun in the river and made them look enchanted. They seemed to be the source of the quiet around them. Like two true escape artists that had freed their mind, resting, calmly awaiting in true buddhist spirit where future would bring them. While I admired the packaging I imagined where they had been made. Could you just go to a buddha statue factory and place an order? I passed them by again a few days later when I continued my own journey. I wondered what their destination will be and hoped that they get to stay together. They seemed to be unmoved by it all.

Once on the side of the road in Twyfelfountain, a tiny settlement of scattered houses in the Naukluft National Park in Namiba. Ancient rock carvings depicting bushman life draw tourists out there into the barren land of the Namib desert. A family operates a healthy business model where they offer digging services to those unfortunate travellers who manage to get stuck with their rental car. The particularly tricky dip of loose gravel could have been their headquarters.
Jakob, head of operations and carries out the price negotiations with the inept drivers, which seem to resolve quickly due to his mature sales skills, his friendly nature or the lack of any other shovel in the next 50km.
He then oversees the progress from under the shade of a nearby tree as his sons then go about the digging. His wife and daughter finally help pushing out the stranded vehicle. The cheering upon success of freeing it is a complimentary part of the job. The work life balance in this enterprise seemed to be incredible as the team seemed to really enjoy themselves and the big bright smiles were free of charge to everyone.
As I witnessed the car infront undergoing the ‘treatment’ Jakob, from under his tree, suddenly shouted across to us and pointed back into the bush where an elephant had appeared. All digging activities ceased and with wild gestures the rare event was discussed loudly until the elephant eventually left out of sight.
I wonder if it somehow was part of the premium package of Jakob’s enterprise.