Art & Life, Genova

I imagine that the person parking their bike might not have been as excited as I was about this quiet space here in the city of Genova.

I love the colour and textures of that pale golden building.  I love that I always find this particular space by chance, while wandering on my way someplace else.

Light is everything here.  There is the way the city looks in that deep rich late afternoon autumn light. I photographed a few city buildings last week, simply because the light had changed how I remembered the cityscape along via XX Settembre.  I get excited over a blue-sky day and the promise of light in those difficult to reach parts of this tightly-built city.  Then a stormy sky promises quite another effect, as the beautiful roofs quietly reveal their full beauty against a backdrop of clouds.

Loving Genova ...

A Celebration ...

The wish to travel seems to me characteristically human; the desire to move, to satisfy your curiosity or ease your fears, to change the circumstances of your life, to be a stranger, to make a friend, to experience an exotic landscape, to risk the unknown …
Theroux

Sourced from Steve McCurry’s photography blog.

Sometimes the photographs, I take here in Genova, are a simple celebration of being back in this place that I love.  It’s not always easy living here, without language, without anything resembling huge amounts of money, without family ... but I keep coming back.  My camera loves me for it.  My photographer’s eyes appreciate it too. 

I find something of New Zealand in the sea and the hills.  I enjoy the quiet kindness of the Genovese met along the way.  These days, I am reading my way into their history.  Steven Epstein’s book covers the period between 958-1528.  Titled ... Genoa and the Genoese, it captures something of the complicated and rich history of this Italian city that so few people I know seem to know.

Hanna came with me this time and she surely fell for the city, hoping her plane might be cancelled ... just for a few days.  There was so much more she wanted to see, and do, and photograph.  I watch it happen… everyone who comes here with me has fallen under the spell of this city so far. 

It’s good to be back.

Holy Light, Genova

We are lonesome animals.
We spend all of our life trying to be less lonesome.
One of our ancient methods is to tell a story begging the listener to say and to feel
‘Yes, that is the way it is, or at least that is the way I feel it.’
You’re not as alone as you thought.
— John Steinbeck

Quote sourced from the blog of the truly gifted photographer, Steve McCurry.

Yesterday, as we worked through our day, Hanna, Francesca and I found time to pop into my favourite church here in Genova ... located in Piazza Maddalena.

I was giving Hanna a little information about photography and explained ... there are all the rules but then you can break them and, sometimes, that’s where the magic happens.

This is one of those shots, for me anyway.  I was handholding my camera in an incredibly dark church, kind of falling in love with the light and voila, the light let me have a little of its beautiful self.

One of the many things I love about Genova, Italy

But perhaps I should begin with the people I meet here in this city I love so well.

Yesterday Hanna and I spent the day with Francesca.  We were putting together a project I have in mind and Francesca had kindly agreed to come along and translate.  She just fitted right in as we wandered and worked our way through the day.  Mille grazie, Francesca.  We had the most excellent time.

And in-between meeting the people we needed to meet, she introduced us to parts of the city we wouldn’t have known about and wouldn’t have dared enter.

Thanks to Francesca, we were able to wander the halls of this grand old house and voila, there was this room, puppet-show in place ... but of course.

There are always these unexpected magical moments here in the ancient city, also called La Superba ... It is also called la Superba - the Superb one - due to its glorious past.