Claire's Book Stand II (II)

The idea of Claire's Book Stand had been to have a gathering in a small park, but the weather brought rain. Instead, then, the prints, books, and magazines were shown at the Freunde von Freunden apartment – with tea and fruit being served in the kitchen. Of this afternoon, I most remember the words and the light: conversations with Claire, Jordan, and Anne, and the spare between-the-rains-light, turning the place into a stage against the windows. The visual conversations, too, between the magic photographs by Mary, Anne, Jordan, and many others.

Claire's Book Stand II (I)

A Sunday in late June. Claire Cotrell's Book Stand II. Went home with Anne's book and a head full of ideas.
Merci, Claire! (Her summer print shop has great work by Mary and Brian, too. And by Sanne and Camille.)

//

the other night at a friends' party. it was a very good night.

to gather with friends

to gather with friends around a table, with homemade food, much to share and some jolly good laughter is one of the best things i can think of. oh, and the light will be low, more often than not, so you might well end up with exactly two pictures to remember that night.

this is the beginning

starting this day off with listening to boy's 'this is the beginning' and breakfast on the sofa. the sun is out, it feels like spring is just around the corner!

(thanks so much for your thoughts on my last post, and your encouragement, it's good to know so many are feeling similarly, we're in it together, aren't we? - have a good weekend!)

back then

back in january, when marion was here, we had coffee at bonanza's. you've seen the polaroids - here is what my other camera snapped. at bonanza's, they do actually roast their own coffee in that huge machine, and they've set up a counter for the most beautiful chemex coffee makers. they will soon start brewing filter coffee in earnest.

(those of you who stop by here as well as at marion's, i realise you might feel like having a bit of a déjà-vu lately. i hope you don't mind. after all, that way you get at least two side of a stories, and that's something, no?)

i am super busy at the moment, hence the random appearances here. how are you doing?

london (part one)

earlier this month, there was a very short visit to london - i wish i had had more time, to meet more friends, to see more, to visit places. things being as they are, i enjoyed seeing a few very close friends, and caught the richter show at the tate just before it closed. no picture-taking in the exhibition itself, but a few behind-the-scene-shots nevertheless. it was a precious day.

taking time

trying to create little islands in a sea of projects is becoming more and more important. last saturday, there was coffee with sandra and marion at the michelberger. plenty to talk and laugh about, such a perfect afternoon!

endings and beginnings

two-thousand eleven

the closeness of friends
the growing-pains of moving forward
the stiffness of neck of desk-bound work
the excitement of each new project
the bliss of doing nothing, in the sun
the joy of shared meals
the challenge of seeing and recording
the need for rest
the taking of breath
the looking forward to things unforeseeable

here's to good-byeing an eventful year--
thank you so much for keeping me company, in so many different ways,
and see you in 2012!

(p.s.: the pics were not taken at my house, we had breakfast at my friends' most beautiful place.)

merry merry

christmas dinner with friends from the bookshop was so wonderfully good. m and k had us round at their place, like before, and i wish i had taken another roll of film.

now it's only such a little while to christmas, and the list of things to do, errands to run, must-not-forgets, is so, so, so long. i wonder whether there is a correlation between increasing age and decreasing prepared-ness. but i bet you are all totally on top of things. right?

well, i'm off for a little while then - spending christmas with friends in berlin, and very much looking forward to the quietness 'between the years'.

so, everyone who is celebrating: merry merry, friends!

(the little poem on the slip of paper up there reads: 'i know not every wish comes true, but i continue wishing, for it is wonderful')

paper

sometimes someone picks you flowers. sometimes a good friend makes them for you with tissue paper and you put them on branches you found on a walk.

i'm ploughing on with work, but were lucky enough to have lunch with this visitor from marseille today. how great to catch up a little!

also thank you so much for your feedback on the wanderer. so many have been visiting already: you are the best! -- oh, and the comment function is now live there, just click on the date of any given post, where you can see and leave comments.

tapas with marion

i would never have found that small spanish restaurant without marion. safely tucked away in a side street, the front looked unassuming, and there were no customers in the first room. it was the tiny courtyard where everybody sat. it was hot, music was blaring from the kitchen, the dishes were marked on a board as long as my arm and my leg together. and my, were they good. (see those wine glasses. i want some.)

so here's to the lady, whose birthday it is today - happy, happy, marion!

a very good day

one sunny day i drove to avignon to see the cy twombly show at the collection lambert and to meet mary. what a perfect day it was. i so enjoyed the exhibition, i think we needed something like three or four hours to see it, because we stopped everywhere, getting lost in some conversation. i remember we wondered how very different sol lewitt's work and his personal space at home were - would you have guessed a master of conceptual, highly cerebral art would have a study full of memorabilia and an amazing moodboard, and would take serial pictures of his crockery? and we did have such a good time looking at lartigue's stereoscopic photographs. what a cheek he was.

cy twombly's photographs were quite wonderful. i loved the early black and white images he took of the shared studio space with rauschenberg in new york, but his later polaroids were quietly poetic, altogether of a different kind.

very kindly, mary gave me a roll of kodak elite chrome, on which these frames were taken. and she introduced me to fondant au chocolat, which we had in the courtyard, after having successfully missed lunch service due to our chatting away. it was a revelation. thanks mary!

(the graphics on the wall are by douglas gordon. marion went as well, on another day.)

going for a stroll

going for a stroll in marseille. what a fascinating city. and i've only seen a tiny fraction of it in 1 1/2 short days.

what you can't see is how hot it was. we simply had to go inside the shops because they were air-conditioned, you see. no other reason, of course.

of friends and places

it may not be the best way of travelling to marseille, on a very hot day in august on just 3 and 1/2 hours of sleep. but then there was marion, who met me at the station and took me to la caravelle for lunch. she is the best city guide, and it was so good seeing her again. the food was delicious - even though i couldn't eat the snails - the tender fish and soft boiled egg with new potatoes, haricots verts and aioli were wonderful. afterwards we went to the corbusier house, but that's another story...

p.s.: when looking at the old port, i can't get this reference out of my head. give me seventies movies any day.

cloudy mornings give way to clear evenings

i know it can't be always so, but i like the thought. we've had our fair share of clouds here recently.

what brightens up a grey day

meeting s and s in a café for tea and a croissant
drawing all kinds of things in a little book
having a little helper when taking out and putting in a roll of film
waiting for the roll to be processed after s pressed 'the button' (twice!)

my plans for the upcoming weeks before the holiday

loads of work, and to ease the pain
sewing a skirt or two
making more jam
having coffee other places than home
go with the flow

p.s.: thanks ever so much for your reading recommendations! and - totally unrelated: i went to apply for an allotment yesterday in the pouring rain, only to learn that they don't even take down names on the waiting list until next year. so disappointed. i might have to look at other options.

photo credit:
second and third image by my little friend s. (3) - i really can't take any credit for these beautiful frames.

garden & something else

these days, when i find time to go to the garden, a long row of sunflowers is greeting me. i'm not usually a fan of that particular flower - so big, so bright, so not subtle - but here it makes perfect sense. it's beautiful. i also love the patches of mixed wild flowers. i think they can happily stand up to all the vegetable bounty. not to be eaten, not to be used in any way, just there to make us smile.

oh, and i must not forget to ask you:

anyone interested in staying in berlin for a week in august? friends of mine are renting out their rather beautiful, split-level apartment in the middle of prenzlauer berg. the apartment is free from august 4 to august 10 (wed-wed). if you prefer, you could also arrive as early as tuesday, 3 aug and get a day for free, so to speak.

if you're interested, please email me (twinklestar at gmx dot net) for more info. the sooner the better!

i might also know of a place in berlin later in august, so please do get in touch if you're interested.

oh, and a very happy 14 juillet to all my friends in france!