Of eyes and hearts

The island

2012-01-22T18:30:00.000+01:00

L'isola

Che cosa è un'isola
solitaria sull'acqua?

Dal profondo emerge
un viso della terra
per sognare.

(Poem by Lina Galli)

Watching the sun set in a plexiglass bowl

2012-01-14T15:09:00.002+01:00

Lake view II

2012-01-08T18:37:00.002+01:00

Lake view

2012-01-01T17:44:00.002+01:00

Last rays of the year

2012-01-01T13:36:00.001+01:00

The ice has arrived on New Year's night. Before the sun retired for the last time of the year, it left a track of golden gems on the almost-solid surface of water... Happy New Year!

Winter glow

2011-12-11T17:12:00.001+01:00

Mid December, still no snow, and the sun doesn't get much higher than this - just enough to set a fallen leaf aglow through the frost...

Shots in the dark

2011-12-04T21:20:00.000+01:00

Hi everybody, long time no see!
This time I've been playing with a LED torch, one of the tiny ones, and an old ring. I used the torch as the only means of lighting in a completely dark room, and it took a while to get a pic I liked. This one makes me think of a nightly sea landscape, with a yellow moon shining.

November colours...

2011-11-21T15:33:00.001+01:00

...beaming in a monochrome landscape

Rain on the river

2011-11-20T20:25:00.000+01:00

Sometimes, you don't even need to make it black and white:

The world's pretty big when you are small

2011-11-18T19:27:00.000+01:00

Once upon a time there were seven small teddybears who were climbing on a big high mountain all covered with frost...

Naked nature

2011-11-15T11:32:00.002+01:00

Hey, I haven't posted any naked nature here for quite a while...

Water-colours

2011-11-13T21:28:00.000+01:00

I'm pretty bad at painting with watercolours, but today, by the lake, I was lucky having both camera and tripod with me!

Bread

2011-11-12T15:31:00.002+01:00

Breakfast buns, baked the way they should be - out of sourdough, flour, water and salt, and a few sunflower seeds. Mixed last night, leavened in the fridge, put into the oven first thing this morning. Yes, they did taste fabulous!

Forgetting anniversaries...

2011-10-31T13:23:00.002+01:00

...is shit that happens. That's why I'm celebrating, today, that this blog of mine now is exactly 1 year and 1 week old. A lovely toddler, I think. Small but beautiful, with few but good friends. May it live, develop, play and learn, and may also we do so, all together <3 Skål!

A house

2011-10-31T10:26:00.002+01:00

Meanwhile...

2011-10-30T11:59:00.000+01:00

...in the heart of the forest, one of the last sunbeams found somebody to play with for a while.

Reeds

2011-10-29T18:01:00.001+02:00

Nothing more, nothing less.

Monday. Autumn. Wet car.

2011-10-17T19:43:00.000+02:00

An alternative use of paint

2011-10-16T14:55:00.000+02:00

Tubes in the sunshine

Playing with safety pins

2011-10-09T11:13:00.000+02:00

Among so many in the crowd, I only had eyes for you...

Happy cam

2011-09-28T00:31:00.000+02:00

Embrace

2011-09-19T12:47:00.000+02:00

Stylish stylite (and how to make one)

2011-09-18T23:05:00.002+02:00

This week's theme was "Illusion", so I thought I could make one out of two pics I took earlier today by the lake. (By the way, if anybody knows the name, in any known language, of the wooden whatever-it-is-called in the first picture, please let me know it!) The result earned the title "It was before the Crane kata, but after the beer" or, more solemnly, "The Pillar Saint".

Here are the two pictures I started with, and the result:


The base

The hubby

Voilà!

Net mess

2011-09-04T17:43:00.000+02:00

September. Time to put away the mosquito nets until next summer...

From the archives

2011-09-03T15:00:00.000+02:00

This has been especially selected for all lovers of pastel colours :)

So white

2011-08-29T23:19:00.002+02:00

Unfriendliness

2011-08-29T13:00:00.000+02:00

This is my contribution to last week's theme for Fotosöndag. The key word was "avig", a Swedish adjective which, among other things, also means approximately "hostile, unfriendly". Well, this building is probably the most unfriendly thing I was able to shoot during the theme week:

Vision of Sundbyberg, or More from a sunny train...

2011-08-20T14:06:00.001+02:00

(... and of course a slight touch of editing ;))

Playing with a camera on a sunny train

2011-08-19T19:59:00.000+02:00

Emergency exit

Tunnelgatan, Stockholm

2011-08-12T12:54:00.003+02:00

Things you can see when looking the wrong direction :-)

Click here to see my tunnel pics on Flickr

Outside Fotografiska

2011-08-11T18:09:00.001+02:00

Yesterday I visited the photo exhibition at Fotografiska, Stockholm. It was an experience of beauty: Robert Mapplethorpe does definitely not belong to the photographers one could ever forget.

What the sky and the city offered to our eyes on our way out, wasn't that bad either:

Over Stockholm, on a late summer evening

2011-08-06T16:55:00.000+02:00

Lost - in a car light

2011-08-02T10:51:00.000+02:00

Moon over the Alps?

2011-08-01T18:29:00.000+02:00

;)

What you didn't know about thistles...

2011-07-20T21:12:00.004+02:00

...is that they can be soft, too :-)

Click here and have a look at my new photo series on Flickr. It's called "Clandestine" and it is all about flowers and plants that grow in abandoned, undesired places.

Power Meet - Famous and fumous, or Reflections upon a Pontiac

2011-07-12T13:50:00.002+02:00

Power Meet is Europe's (or maybe even the world's) biggest meeting for owners of vintage American cars. This is what makes my town famous - and fumous: hordes of visitors from all corners of the continent, thousands of cars and burnout tyres, as well as floods of beer and tons of exhaust gases, roll all over the place for a few summer days.

My thoughts and feelings towards the Power Meet are a bit mixed up. I see the people's pride for their cars and their subculture. I imagine the unleashed creativity flow that all those old-time engineers in Detroit probably experienced when designing these spectacular glittering structures.

Beyond the cheerful surface, though, what is revealed to me when I edit my pics at home is the imaginary landscape of a world designed by white Western men, with themselves as the obvious centre. A dream landscape that's brightly-coloured and shiny, measured, polished, controllable, obedient - and where natives and women, eagles and felines, only exist as stylized trophies decorating the scene. A world where the Pontiac Indian is the only good Indian.

My complete Power Meet photo series is linked here.

Girl power

2011-07-05T20:49:00.000+02:00

A young mind in action

The martagon lily

2011-07-04T22:16:00.000+02:00

Black, white and in between

2011-07-03T16:54:00.000+02:00

This is one of the pictures I've just posted on Flickr (click here). In them you can see a few bits and pieces of Stockholm on a summer evening: roofs, palaces, skies, seagulls - and a tiger :)

Harbour reflections

2011-06-28T23:45:00.001+02:00

Visitors from outer space

2011-06-23T12:50:00.000+02:00

Sink star

2011-06-20T09:42:00.001+02:00

This one found its five minutes in the limelight before the bitter end.

Focused 15

2011-06-18T10:15:00.001+02:00

This is my youngest son, 15 years old. He allowed me to take a picture of him as a model to illustrate the theme "Focused"- an attitude that's typical for him when he is absorbed by sketching and drawing. (Thank you, H!)

Fifteen is an awesome age, and for a few of us it was a time of storm, solitude, invisibility and longing. But when now my son is stepping further out into the world and towards his adulthood, I can see that he is equipped with the best things you can ever have with you on such a journey - even better than smartphones or powerful internet connections: the safety and love you get from a big family where mutual appreciation and help is the rule, and from a vast network of friends, including an inner circle of life-long pals who'll always stand by your side. I'm proud and honored to be a part of this.

Hope

2011-06-12T12:14:00.001+02:00

This week's theme for the photo group Fotosöndag has been Hope. I've searched for motives symbolizing just hope, and yesterday, at last, I found what I was looking for. In my own kitchen :-)

The picture below is my contribution to the group. The whole series can be found on http://www.flickr.com/photos/ofeyesandhearts/

Breakfast underneath a striped awning II

2011-06-11T22:31:00.001+02:00

A new sunny week-end is here, and it's time to continue last week's exploration of a striped awning's reflections. Today it was the egg's turn:

Lonely and blue

2011-06-06T11:18:00.001+02:00

This blueberry (or rather, blue berry) is my contribution to "Blues", the latest photo theme on Fotosöndag. If you Ctrl-click on the pic, you can see the whole thing on their webpage in a new tab :-)

Breakfast underneath a striped awning

2011-06-05T11:42:00.002+02:00

Berries and stripes 2, a photo by Of eyes and hearts on Flickr.

You know what? Now I'm on Flickr, too! Click on "Of eyes and hearts" in the caption (or on the picture) to get there and see more of this photo series.

Things I saw in Amsterdam - Floating on night lights

2011-06-04T16:27:00.000+02:00

Finding NeMo

2011-06-03T16:00:00.000+02:00

NeMo, Amsterdam. Design: Renzo Piano.

Things I saw in Amsterdam - tram stops and beach ball blokes

2011-06-02T14:00:00.000+02:00

Below and above Amsterdam

2011-06-01T23:36:00.003+02:00

Poles - what the city is built upon...

... and they've definitely not finished building yet!

Harbor after the rain

2011-05-26T10:49:00.000+02:00

Below and above the surface

2011-05-23T22:31:00.000+02:00

Under the bridge

2011-05-22T20:40:00.000+02:00

The river crossing our town is small and looks quite insignificant, but it does have its magic spots, if you can find them ;)

More wings

2011-05-15T18:51:00.000+02:00

Getting this close to a big plane doesn't happen every day, so I took some more pictures. It's interesting, how hard lines and soft lines combine, as well as lightness and weight...

Under huge wings 1... again

2011-05-13T19:36:00.001+02:00

(Just re-posting the pictures that disappeared when the Blogger people messed up things seriously for a couple of days!).
And hmm, a thought about the second picture: a rolling Jumbo gathers no moss ;)

Where I was today at 13:24

2011-05-11T17:23:00.001+02:00

Sitting on carriage 3, in a train that was surprisingly on time :)
(I really *love* trains - even though the Swedish national railroad company is doing its very best to make me quit!)

By a dirty window

2011-05-02T15:56:00.000+02:00

Of rays, and hearts of lace

2011-05-01T23:31:00.001+02:00

Slimy stuff

2011-04-23T17:42:00.000+02:00

Ingredients: water, algae, slimy stuff, sunlight

Stems II

2011-04-22T00:39:00.000+02:00

...and some new rhubarb in the sunset light

Stems I

2011-04-21T20:26:00.001+02:00

Last year's lovage...

Ingredients: a green glass, shadow and sunlight

2011-04-18T18:07:00.000+02:00

Sometimes, the glass is greener on this side of the lens :)

Getting ready for summer

2011-04-17T18:42:00.000+02:00

All ice has melted, there are water pools everywhere, and nature is preparing an explosion of life... Any day now...

Wind

2011-04-07T18:24:00.000+02:00

It's blowing hard outside. I opened my bedroom window and let it come inside and play with the curtain for a while while I was packing my stuff. I'll be abroad for some days: no camera at all, and just enough internet to keep in touch. Take care and see you soon!

Almost gone

2011-04-05T21:33:00.000+02:00

It's almost gone now, the ice on the lake. These pictures are from April 2010, just weeks before a long warm summer:

On the kitchen table, an early morning

2011-03-31T22:02:00.002+02:00

Late last night, somebody finished all the raspberry drink...

The brightest moon

2011-03-20T00:52:00.000+01:00

Being at the shortest possible distance to the earth, and on top of that also full, yesterday's moon was the brightest we'll ever see in our lifetime. However, as always, it ended up fighting for attention with the street lamps in an icy pool by the side of the road.

Things you can see at a building site

2011-03-06T17:21:00.003+01:00

Plastic sheets.

Something really different

2011-03-05T17:32:00.000+01:00

Today I'd like to share with you a picture that's not a photo and that I've not produced myself, but which fits in this blog because the artist is very dear to my heart - and eyes. My 15 year old son asked me to scan one of his drawings, and here is a detail of a bigger work. Well, of course I'm his mom and everything he draws is a masterpiece to my eyes. But, honestly, don't you think the boy seems to know how to use a pencil?

Now I've changed this blog's header!

2011-03-05T17:23:00.000+01:00

Isn't it nice? Now I've got eggshells everywhere - on the website, on the blog, even on my new business cards. Apparently I'm going through an egg phase in my life (ovulation?).

A daughter's smile among the crowd

2011-02-27T18:18:00.000+01:00

Black and white...

2011-02-19T11:50:00.001+01:00

... or colour? Or, why not both?

Same same but different

2011-02-18T17:07:00.000+01:00

Through thin ice

2011-02-13T18:09:00.002+01:00

The colours of rust

2011-02-06T17:25:00.000+01:00

What's left

2011-02-04T22:29:00.002+01:00

Breakfast habits

2011-02-01T10:05:00.001+01:00

I usually gather small crumbs inside the egg shell when I've finished eating. Yesterday, I had an egg and a cup of berries. Just when I was about to leave the table, I noticed that a solitary blueberry was staring at me... so I stared back at it.

More ice?!?

2011-01-26T20:38:00.000+01:00

Hey, it's still winter, after all :)

The last drop of sunset...

2011-01-25T16:22:00.001+01:00

... just before dark.

Quiet

2011-01-24T23:42:00.000+01:00

Quite so.

Purple haze

2011-01-23T23:56:00.000+01:00

I've been on a trip to a beautiful place, this weekend :)

Kaleidoscoping

2011-01-16T14:11:00.000+01:00

Hi everybody, long time no see :)

It has been a pretty busy week, and one of the things that have kept me busy has been the sorting out and tidying up of bookshelves and other dark and dusty places where we put things we no longer want to see around us. It goes without saying that it is a project of gigantic proportions which will take lots of man-days (not to mention woman-days!) of work to complete.

Anyway, one of the pleasant things with that kind of projects is that you usually re-discover books and things you've missed for years, or things you didn't know you had at all. This time, I found a kaleidoscope I remember having bought in Germany on a choir trip, more than 20 years ago, and which I believed to be lost for ever.

The word "kaleidoscope" has Greek roots and means "(device that makes you) look at beautiful shapes". So, in a way, it is related to photography, isn't it?

Cosy

2011-01-09T22:49:00.000+01:00

Why not spend the evening in a hammock, by the light of a MacBook?

Souvenir from outer space

2011-01-05T20:23:00.004+01:00

Celebration in free association

2011-01-02T20:01:00.000+01:00

Today I've decided to give you a fly pic from a past summer. Why? Because today, when I was out for a quick walk, I noticed something delightful: the sun's rays felt warm already, even though it is only January 2! This can only mean that we're on our way towards a new summer (even though it'll take us some time to really get there). Besides, I didn't have my camera with me on my walk, so I needed something from the archives to illustrate this post. And, thinking about sun and summer, what would be better than a fly, sparkling in all its glory, to celebrate this day?

A daughter's eyes

2010-12-31T23:04:00.000+01:00

New Year's eve, she's all dressed up and ready for the party. What are you looking forward to, for the new year? May all our childrens' greatest hopes some day be true!

Exercising in peace

2010-12-29T19:13:00.000+01:00

Today, the macro lens and I spent some time considering the peace lily...

On the bridge

2010-12-28T23:49:00.000+01:00

Now the solstice time has passed by, and we're once again on our way towards the sun...

Tangles

2010-12-27T17:59:00.001+01:00

Dunno what or why, but there is something about tangles and branches and twigs...

Same subject, new lens

2010-12-26T20:23:00.000+01:00

This year I got a macro lens for Xmas! This is how it makes me see that very same tree:

A fast-moving tree

2010-12-24T12:37:00.001+01:00

Merry Xmas to each and every follower of this blog!

Halo

2010-12-21T21:36:00.000+01:00

Nightly duel

2010-12-21T00:56:00.001+01:00

At the collision point between city light and winter moon light, there stood a tree.

Trains of thoughts

2010-12-18T15:50:00.000+01:00

I've not posted anything here for a couple of days. Instead, I've been celebrating the end of my course of studies. After almost two years of commuting, no more crowded early-morning trains for a looong time. Yay!
The early-afternoon trains are much less crowded, so everybody is free to sleep and/or listen to their favourite music in peace in their cosy corners. A winter day, cold light from outside, warmer light from the train's reading lamps. I had my camera with me, so I didn't read all that much :)

The red star in the forest

2010-12-14T18:19:00.000+01:00

December 12, 1:45 p m

On the ice planet

2010-12-13T13:52:00.001+01:00

Lake Mälaren, December 12, 14:15

Snow trolls

2010-12-12T18:24:00.002+01:00

This fellow was turned into a snowman when it got hit by the evening sun:

Prague by night

2010-12-12T00:04:00.000+01:00

This is a beautiful place where strange things can happen on misty, full-moon nights... This was back in 2008, and the little camera I had with me did a pretty good job after all:

Air

2010-12-10T17:23:00.001+01:00

This was during a walk by our lake, a few years ago. It was a mild December afternoon (not at all like it is now!), and the ice was covered by inches of water and veils of mist. Standing on the pier was like floating in mid air - I wonder if I'll ever see such a thing again.