When to bring a camera and when not to bring a camera....
This is my FIRST blog in my newly renovated website. I've never really understood what a blog was until I started this one.
My photography has lead me to places I may have never ventured otherwise, both spiritually and physically. This blog is a wonderful space for people to view my life and work with a different perspective. Creating this website has been a true labor of love - it's been like building an enormous mansion with it’s numerous rooms and structural elements. The daughter of an accomplished interior designer/home builder I was raised to understand the significance of a practical floor plan mixed with aesthetic curb. I hope you’ll find the site entertaining, easy to navigate and informative.
After more than 20 years of shooting non-stop I always think I’ll take a trip, leave my camera behind, and just experience life without visually documenting it. Making pictures is my "job" so during my time off you’ll rarely see me with a camera in hand. But years ago an ex-boyfriend was always asking me to please leave my camera at home during one our romantic weekend "vacation" trips, (apparently I spent too much time behind the lens!!).
This past year I was “gifted” with several amazing opportunities to travel quite a bit. I visited Mexico, Hawaii, Europe and northern California. Between my frequent flyer miles and a special airline employee companion fare, my flight costs were minimal. Having friends who live in all these amazing places offering me their hospitable accommodations made it all the more possible.
Having lived many years in France I developed many close foreign friendships. Some dear friends of mine from L.A. moved to a mag nificent home in Hawaii a few years ago, and as "travel addicts" like myself, participated in a unique home exchange program. One of their exchanges was an estate home in a small village outside of Paris. I was fortunate to have been invited to come join. After 10 years this was my first trip back to Paris! Unfortunately the dollar’s exchange rate (now considered the American "peso") would have made a trip like this completely out of my price range. Another mutual friend, May-Britt Boe who resides in a magical Norwegian island above the Arctic Circle agreed to join us along with her 4 year-old daughter. She works for Scandinavian Airlines and can fly herself and a guest anywhere for next to nothing. We all had a wonderful week together. Yes I brought my camera…. just in case, I told myself, there was one of those "dam I wish I had my camera" kind of shots I couldn’t miss. During my Hawaii trip some months earlier my camera collected dust in my suitcase while I sipped Mai-tails poolside for a week! (Hawaii has that kind of effect on people! It’s a "vacation" place! Paris is a "trip" kind of place). My photography style and perspective on life has changed quite a bit over the years and I thought it might be a nice opportunity to document the Paris I knew from another perspective this time around. Keeping it light I brought only one camera and one lens. The famous painter Claude Monet always said Paris has a special light that’s truly unique from any other place in the world. I had been reminded of that the first day I landed.
The images from this trip came from a nostalgic, more mature look back at the small details I must have overlooked during the years I lived in that amazing city. This time I slowed down, looked around a bit and took it all in: the people, sites, smells, food and the "feel" of a place I used to call home. It was wonderful. The best part was that this time I actually got to eat at the restaurants. Years before I had only dreamt of this as I pressed my nose against the glass front window.
 
After a week in Paris we flew north to the Lofoten islands of northern Norway. Paris to Olso, Oslo to Bodo, Bodo to Lofoten islands. One flight to the next moving further and further north. Most travelers wouldn’t think of venturing this far north and if it weren’t for my dear friend May-Britt I wouldn’t have either. It’s a strange, ominous and beautiful place where a dark ocean meets an endless sky and the people live someplace in between. The weather is harsh and truly dictates people’s live in a way like no other - a place only the hearty could endure. Who else could live in a place where almost half the year there is little to no sunlight while the other half there is almost an endless amount? A special kind of people. Once you’re there you understand. The Vikings discovered an untouched, pristine landscape and a rushing current of endless fresh salmon and cod enough to feed a nation for a million years!
The last leg of the journey is always my favorite. We fly in a small 12 seater airplane low across the ocean over a crooked landscape of tiny, rocky, minimally-inhabited islands with few trees. The plane dips between a vibrant rainbow and I am, once again, captivated by this fairytale-like place, like a child somehow expecting to see a troll, some goblins or maybe even "Big Foot"! It had been 7 years this time since I had been back to the island. May-Britt’s niece’s were young girls then. Now they're all grown up. Somehow I was able to communicate in my broken Swedish-Norwegian –a language I picked up over the years from my numerous trips to Scandinavia. This trip we don’t tell her parents I'm coming. It’s a surprise – especially for her father, now in his 70’s, who had grown quite fond of me from the last trip - mainly because we somehow understood each other’s crazy sense of humor. The Scandinavian’s appear shy and reserved at first but once you break the ice, (pardon the pun!) they’re quite fun, truly genuine, good humored and extremely well-read. I’m embarrassed to say they know more about American history than most of us do!!
May-Britt’s family, consisting of 3 handsome brother’s, their wives and children, all live on t he island. The family has lived on the same farm and the same plot of land for over 5 generations!!! Dairy farmer’s mostly, they work the land and the land works them. The young girls are horse lovers as most girls are and on warm days they actually swim with their horses in the lake in front of their farm house. Unfortunately on this trip it was too cold, otherwise I would have loved to capture that on film! (Next time!). I have promised all of them that when they are old enough they can come for a visit to America!
The trip ended with a day in Oslo before boarding the plane. I was able to look up an old boyfriend from my photo college days to get together and reminisce about old times. Killing some time in between our meeting I was able to meander a bit alone and truly enjoyed shooting all that is uniquely Scandinavian.
 
Looking back these images remind me of the romance of Europe and how and why I got into shooting in the first place. For an intense, Scorpio-driven, all-or-nothing, “type A” person photography has been the gift that balances out my life somehow. It’s allowed me to slow down, stop, look and listen. I hope you will too……
 
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