Ólafur Arnalds

I'm bitter today. And freezing cold.
It's -5 degrees outside and I just spent the past 4 hours standing outside, on a train station. I was literally hurting cause of the cold. I'm much better now, I managed to get into a train and am now happily sitting on the floor.
As is normal every time I have to travel back home, snow wreaked havoc on the european transportation system and everything paralyzed. Being a wise man, I planned ahead this year and got a train ticket to Paris one day before my flight. Lucky me, I would have lost the flight otherwise. Still, I don't wanna count my eggs before they hatch. There's so much than can (and probably will) go wrong between now and tomorrow's flight :)
Anyway. this is about photography, so let's get onto that.

The topic at hand today is Ólafur Arnalds.



That's him up there, "Oli" playing his piano. If you are not familiar with his music, I couldn't recommend it enough. Whatever your musical tastes are, I believe no one can fail to appreciate his music. It's not easy to classify him though. He's from Iceland, so he definitely has some of that "icelandic sound" going for him... but you'd be mistaken if you thought he is just another Sigur Ros clone. What he does would be best described as "modern classical" with a touch of electro.
Bottom-line is he produces some of the most beautiful melodies you'll ever hear, using a piano, a quartet of strings and a computer.
With music, it's easier to just listen and form your own opinions though. His myspace is: http://www.myspace.com/olafurarnalds

His concert was absolutely beautiful. Magical. They had spread carpets and pillows over the floor, so everyone could sit comfortably and just enjoy the music.
And enjoy we did!!.

Photographically, though, it was hell for a photographer. On the one hand, you had to deal with the fact that everyone was just lying on the floor, so moving around was not an option. I had to shoot everything from the spot I was sitting in. That was not all! to make it worse, his music is so dynamic, that when it's soft, it's really soft. Soft enough for a camera going off to be a problem. I could only take pictures in the "heavy" parts of the set. The added complication of that being that since the light show was synced to the music, I just got pictures of the "crazier" parts. The mellow parts were awesome too. Believe me :)


Some of the girls from the string quartet.




The rest of the quartet.


I don't think there's much else to say about this concert. Just go and become a fan of his music. It's really worth it.

Oh, yeah. I have a thing with musicians. It's REALLY easy for me to see a girl playing an instrument and not fall for her.
This was not the exception. I fell in love with the cello player at first sight.
Of course, my favorite picture of the set is one of her.
Here it is:


 

Until next time, hopefully from sunny Buenos Aires.

G L O W pt2

So, I promised more G L O W pics on my last post. I'm -as usual- a bit late, but here it finally is; GLOW Pt2. As anyone who has seen my pictures knows, I am:
(a) More interested in shooting people than stuff (shooting in a photographical sense, of course) and,
(b) Super shy. Which kind of goes against (a).

So, events like G L O W, where everyone is carrying a camera around AND is really into the exhibition are a blessing for me. I'm essentially invisible there. I have the freedom to shoot away with nobody really noticing AND because everybody is so busy observing the art, they let their true selves shine trough.
When you want to take a really good picture of someone, just make sure he/she is not thinking about it. Henry Cartier Bresson was a master at that; striking conversations with his sitters for hours until they forgot about it all. He just waited, and then, at the precise instant when the true self of his subject shone through -via a certain sparkle in the eye or a minuscule gesture- click! He got the pic he was waiting for.

I'm not trying to compare myself with HCB, I'm pretty rubbish at portraits still. So I take advantage of these situations where I can still find people in a rather natural habitat of sorts, where I'm just not there.

So, enough with the boring intro. On to some pictures.


I love this one. There's nothing particularly fancy about it but as soon as I saw that wall near the exit of one of the exhibition halls, I knew what to do. I just went out of the way, sat down in the dark and waited for people to pass by.
Then, it was just a matter of timing the shots. I got all sort of variations of this pic: Families together, people opening umbrellas, playing with cameras, tall people, short people... you get the idea. Of course, I'm not showing those alternate shots. I know better :)


The guys overseeing one of the installations. Their stance is more interesting than the actual thing, I guess.

Click the read more thingy for more pics.