Tugboat Printshop

Just discovered these wonderful woodblock prints by Tugboat Prtintshop. It reminds me of illustrations in a fairytale book, lovely colours! Might be an idea for Christmas presents this year....

"Robin and Juniper"

"The Moon"

"Garden"

"Mama Bear"

Making of "Mama Bear"

All images taken from http://www.tugboatprintshop.com/

Paris & Lyon

A combination of work + leisure took me to Paris and Lyon last week; a nice escape from my daily routines, I have to say. And surprisingly enough I really enjoyed Paris this time - it wasn't stressful at all and besides work I still had time to soak up some "culture" (and yes, this also includes my morning coffee on a sunny terrace in Montmartre). 

Paris being Paris there are of course a million things to do and I managed to go to the Musée d'Orsay for the very first time as well as visiting the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson. They were showing photographs by Sergio Larrain, a Chilean photographer who was also part of Magnum Photos. 

Some of the images, especially of the street children in Chile, were very capturing and I especially like black and white photography so this was a real treat. If you happen to be in Paris before December 22nd you should have a look, the entry is free on Wednesdays after 18:30.

 

Images above taken from http://lettresexpres.wordpress.com/2013/08/17/photographe-du-samedi-12-sergio-larrain/

US and A

After 28 years it was finally my turn to discover this country of unlimited freedom, where everything is bigger and brighter, where dreams come true and everyone lives happily ever after - well, maybe not exactly but nevertheless, I was impressed by my first trip to the US. Some stereotypes and prejudices were confirmed, some were corrected. But the most important thing is: I had a great time!!

Because I like making lists, here is the US in pros and cons:

Pros

- Nice, welcoming and helpful people
- Beautiful nature (Yosemite - wowowow!)
- Free, accessible and clean toilets everywhere
- Iced coffee
- Multi-culturalism & diversity
- Great food (take that, McDonald's & co!)
- Creativity

Cons

- Wastefulness and lack of environmental awareness
- Non-existant public healthcare and social security (and the shocking amount of homeless and mentally ill people in the streets as a result of this)
- Bad employment conditions (10 days of holidays a year, are you kidding me?!)
- Reliance on cars to get around, poor public transport
- Racial and social segregation (still, 50 years after "I have a dream" - that's sad)

But in the end, these pictures probably speak for themselves anyways.

Wolfgang Tillmans photography

I discovered Wolfgang Tillman's work at an exhibition at the Serpentine Galley in London in 2010 but I have come accross his works several times since then, most recently in the Transport for London campaign on the 150th anniversary of the tube.

My favourite photographs are the ones of the night sky, even though I don't think they were meant to go together as a set.  I also like the more abstract, colourful ones that were on display at the Serpentine Gallery and which also feature on the tube campaign:

"Venus Transit"

"In flight astro II"

"Kilimanjaro"

"Freischwimmer"

"Urgency XXII"

More information can be found on Tillmans' website.

Athens

The month of May has been ridiculously busy and the days just flew past. It's partly the new job which keeps me on my toes and is sometimes quite demanding and partly the "leisure stress" that you're getting with all those long weekends. Is it just me or does it just feel like you should go on a trip somewhere if the weekend has an extra day??

So, the month of May has taken me to Israel, Athens and Germany, where I actually went twice to visit family. On top of that, we had our extra-super-mega-special Eurovision show put on by my choir in which we put a lot of effort an energy. It paid off! After almost 1 year of rehearsals, in the final stages with 2 to 3 rehearsals a week, sometimes up to 5 hours long, a lot of preparation and practise and chaos finally turned into a wonderful show. I'm not much of a showbiz and limelight-loving person but even I enjoyed it, especially the dance choreographies.

But the best thing about this show is probably not even the applause and the sense of achievement to have managed such a big project but the fact that we have all gotten to know each other better and we have become closer as a group. We're now taking a rehearsal break over the summer but I'm already looking forward to starting again in September!

Palestinian embroidery

One thing I noticed especially during my trip to Palestine was the beautiful embroidery that women sport on their traditional gowns, especially the older women that I saw in Jerusalem. Of course most of the tourist shops sell cushion covers, blankets, iPhone holders, pencil cases and pretty much everything else you could somehow embroider but I actually found it one of the more interesting souvenirs.

Since I'm interested in textiles, handicraft and textile design I was searching the internet to find those traditional patterns which are usually worked in cross-stitch and contain mainly geometric or natural shapes such as flowers, trees or leaves. I was even looking around shops if you could get a "DIY Palestinian cross-stitch set" with the pattern and the yarn but this doesn't seem to have a lot of demand. Maybe a good business idea? The Palestinians sure don't lack a sense for that!

Here are some of the sample patterns I found online:

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/42957090@N06/7926022786/

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ramallah_woman_15029v.jpg

Source: http://www.photographium.com/woman-in-embroidered-costume-ramallah-palestine-1898-1914

 And this is a website which had a very good overview of charts (well, basically the only one I found):
http://palestinianembroider.tripod.com/traditional.htm


 I'm seriously thinking about ordering some of the books as the internet does not have many ready-to-use patterns.

Israel, Palestine, Jordan

The post-travel euphoria has not quite worn off yet. I had an amazing time in Israel, Palestine and Jordan and one of the things which impressed me most was how friendly and open everyone was - not quite what I expected in a region which is mainly famous for its religious and political conflicts than anything else. Some of the interesting and rewarding encounters I had were the following:

- couchsurfing in Jersulem and having a shabbath dinner with our host and some of her friends
- getting a lift from a guy who took us all the way to the place in town where we wanted to go
- people starting to chat to us in cafés and at bus stops, giving us directions or just asking if we needed help - out of genuine friendliness and not because they wanted money (which I suspected in the beginning)
- a lady at the fast-food restaurant at the airport who insisted on buying me a coke when I tried to explain to the cashier that I didn't have enough cash left to pay for the food AND the drink

I guess I should have less prejudices and be more open to new people myself. And I totally believe that one way to be happier is to interact with people and to exchange views, thoughts and ideas and find that sometimes we have more in common than we think.