Sunday, November 13, 2016

Thinking Black-and-White: Clouddreamers



Clouddreamers
Triggered by a cloudscape picture (above) winning the 2nd prize in the Spanish "Google loves Earth" competition 2016, I was asked to illustrate a volume of Beletra Almanako, an Esperanto literature magazine. The catch - the pictures needed to be black and white. So I had to think of black & white moments, impressions that had resulted in black & white pictures at the time, or could have. Think counterlight, moonlight magic, snow and surf, clouds and cairns, rocks and ravens .... Cloud Dreamers was taken in the Picos de Europa mountain range, a rugged national park in Northern Spain, on a summer evening near the mountain refuge next to the El Naranjo de Bulnes ​rock.​

Moonset Morning


Also in Picos de Europa, this almost-full moon added some extra black-and-white light to a phantastic early morning hike. Gray and white, snow on rock, mares on moon.

Cloud Snappers

With only rocks around us, and clouds beneath us, this was a natural black & white moment, with the weather turning gray on the top of Pania della Croce, one of the highest peaks in the Apuanian Alps, during an Esperanto Hiking Weekend, Montkabana Renkontiĝo 2016.


Grass Girl

Also in the Apuanian Alps, at lower altitudes, the afternoon sun did get through, and its counterlight rays turned the grass white. Taking a black & white break at the farm house ruins, the grass girl.


Haleakala Worsbip

Haleakala is the 2nd-highest volcano in Hawaii, 3000 m, on Maui island. The name means "House of the Sun". The peak becomes a place of worship at sunset, and you can see the last rays reflectes on the radio telescopes 70 km away on the 4000 m volcano peak of neighbouring Big Island.


Blinded by the Light

At 4600 m altitude, the sun is close and strong, and the air thin and clear. In Ladakh, the Indian part of Tibet, a building of buddhist worship, steeped in white light. Hiking ancient paths in ancient ways. Mountain encroach. Blindingly.

Shining Stone

At its top, the Spanish mountain chain of Sierra Nevada is black and white, honouring its snowy name. Hiking across a moonscape, obsidian rocks surfaces gleaming in a strong June counterlight, banning the snow, between Mulhacén and Valete, the highest mountains of continental Spain, conquered on the same day.


Elemental Movement

Stroke after stroke, towards the glacier, following the rythm of the Sogne fjord water ways. Counterligt scissor-cutting the mountainscape into a gallery.


Transition

Winter has cloaked the Danish lakes and forests in a fresh shade of white, frosting the trees and powdering the ice. I was cross-country skiing, looking for a way back, when this dam offered a path across the lake. Transition between lake sides, transition, a white path across dark ice, seeking the trees on the other side.



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