Tag Archives | Paros

Busy, busy, busy…

By John on August 13, 2013 in beauty, Greece, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, spiritual journey, Uncategorized, working

The Greek summer holiday is upon us and Paroikia is mobbed with tourists from Athens and beyond. The roads are crammed, the cafes are overrun and anyone with any sense stays away from town unless they really need to do something vitally important, like go to the hospital or something. This will all end, for the most part, in about 5 days, but for now…

I went to Naoussa last night with some friends to see the opening of another artist’s work. He is very technical, very intellectual and, I feel, on the cusp of something. What I felt when I walked into the room was a sense of change, a shift and alteration of shape in his thinking and raison. It was a transitional vibe. Others did not feel that way, but so what. He would say that too. I am quite sure he is not particularly worried about whether or not people like his work, or even understand it in the same way as he does. I, for one, was happy to go and see the event. In regards to the holiday crowds, Naoussa is very different than Paroikia. It is not stretched along the seafront but rather all crammed in together, like a white-washed, sun-burned and idiotic fist. This made for dense crowds and the ‘wall-to-wall-people’ effect. I am not a huge fan of that. It was a relief to return to Paroikia, sit at a table with friends and have a late supper.

My own show is on the near horizon. The 22 photographs are matted, framed and behind glass. They look wonderful. The space will be free on Saturday morning and, I hope, I can begin hanging my pieces that afternoon. The posters start going up tomorrow and I have been handing out cards. More cards to go out this weekend. I have designed and put in place a new website specifically for this show and will send out an email blast to the mailing list this Sunday. I don’t want anyone to see the show in it’s entirety until then.

I am pretty nervous about this show. It is a big deal for me, perhaps bigger than I realize. The future will tell…

I have decided to save some money this year and have bought a bike–a used mountain bike from a local bike shop. I like it a lot. I have been cycling to a local beach every day, jumping in the sea to cool off and then cycling back. The weight I gained while I was in the USA will drop off and I save money and gas to boot. In the off-season, it cost me 320 euros per month to rent a car. This is extravagant. The bike cost 375 euros and with the added helmet, pump, spare tube, etc…the bill came to 515 euros. There are still a few items to pick up but they are not necessities. If I can work my way back down to 82 kilos from the 88 I now currently weigh, then I will be happy.

One thing I have noticed is the obvious disregard the tourists have for bikes on the road. Just an observation. Perhaps I will start a movement based on the idea of banning all non-essential motor vehicles from the island of Paros, or at least Paroikia and the surrounding environs. It would be a safer, quieter and more interesting place to live, that is for sure. Imagine all the car rental companies renting bicycles instead? Cheaper, less insurance, less maintenance…For now, I stick to the backroads.

JDCM

My new bike…

Back on Paros…

By John on August 3, 2013 in Greece, Paros, Uncategorized

hibiscus Words cannot describe…

All images from my Leica M8, Voigtlander 28mm lens.

Updates from the road…

By John on July 6, 2013 in beauty, Cyclades stone walls, Cycladic stone walls, Greece, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, spiritual journey, stone walls

I am in New York. It is hot, humid and lush. It is hard to describe the quantity of water on the land and in the air. Back on my Parian home the heat is the same but the arid conditions make for a more pleasant experience. Outside my window the trees and foliage are dense green, impenetrable without the use of a machete or chainsaw. I can hear it grow, sucking up moisture from the rich earth.

A view from my mother’s front porch, Ancramdale, NY.

I am back in America to visit my family, and only for a month. If all goes well I will be back on Paros on August 1st ready for the final push towards my solo exhibit of large format portraiture. It has been almost two years since the project began and I am looking forward to the event. I am nervous, yes, but in anticipation, not dread. I know my work can stand on its own as a complete body. I also know that whoever views it will bring something unique to the experience. I am also currently designing a new website specifically for the portraits. I will launch this site after the show opens on August 18th.

For the time being, I will visit with my elderly parents and my dear sisters. I hope to drop in on a fellow student and alumna of the Aegean Center, but time and schedules will determine that visit. I am able to catch up with good friends and compare notes on how our lives are faring.

I am experiencing a good amount of culture shock here. The cars all all huge and the food seems heavy to my palate. As I sit here at my computer I sweat. Just sweat. I am not even exerting myself. There are no sounds of ferries docking, motor scooters riding down the narrow streets of my neighborhood. No smell of the sea. I cannot walk to my favorite cafe. It is supposed to rain tonight and perhaps that will ease the heat, but it also promises high, hot and humid conditions for tomorrow. I am not whinging, just noticing some differences.

Todays post has a new header image. It is a section of wall behind my mother’s house. The stones are slate and granite, green with growth. So different from the Kykladic structures of which I have grown so fond. Different, yet the same. It serves the same purpose: it is a retaining wall preventing the downhill slide of earth after the rains.

The skies have suddenly clouded over. There is a low rumble of thunder in the air.

JDCM

Return to Paros…

By John on June 25, 2013 in beauty, craft, Cyclades stone walls, Cycladic stone walls, darkroom work, Greece, hiking in the Cyclades, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, rangefinder camera, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, stone walls, working

As the ferry rounded the northern tip of the island, opposite Naoussa, and I saw the lighthouse atop Cape Korakas, I knew that I was home. I leaned against the port gunwales, waiting until we had passed the Cave of Archilochus, and then I went back inside the old ship and gathered my things. I was the first person downstairs in the garage bay. I walked off the NEL Lines Aqua Jewel with a feeling of deep relief and happiness. I was home, back on Paros. I allowed the noises and smells of a busy Greek island port to fill my senses as I walked back to my flat.

That was two days ago and since then I have taken care of essential business, mostly laundry. I have come back to my favorite cafes and eaten in my favorite restaurants. All is well with the world. In other words, life continues and changes in small and big ways and I find myself, as usual, listening more than talking during intense discussions with friends. My grandmother always said that was a character trait that would serve me well. We’ll see…

I do have a lot to say, but verbally it seems that many others say it so much better than I, so why paraphrase? Many years ago I was an avid musician. I wrote music, songs, lyrics, played in bands. I did this for many years-decades. I had a lot to say then, or I thought so. In the end the words became dark, sinister and negative. The bands moved on without me and I dropped the music, along with a few other pastimes. I can still play the instrument, but the desire to express with sound has left me. Just part of the Great Circle, I suppose. These days I have a quieter way to explain the world. I find it much more calming, and good deal lighter in actual weight. It lets me stop, look and breathe. The shutter clicks. I feel that this is where I should have been all along.

The island has become the color of worn brass and oxidized aluminum. The craggy, yellow-brown contours are set off by the blue sky and the deeper, indigo sea. White buildings dot the arid landscape, like so many chunks of salt-lick. The tomatoes are rich and sweet and there is fish to savor in a nearby taverna. In two days I leave Paros again, this time for America. I will visit with friends and family, eat American food and have my senses bombarded with different sights, most of them very green and wet. It will be humid and there will be rain.

En route I will stop in Athens. While I am there I will visit the Benaki Museum and see a large photography exhibit by Constantine Manos.

Now I am rambling. It is hot and I need to add some images to this post. These are from my recent island hop.

JDCM

Folegandros

Images from the past weeks…

By John on June 20, 2013 in beauty, craft, Cyclades stone walls, Cycladic stone walls, Greece, hiking in the Cyclades, Naxos, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, rangefinder camera, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, stone walls

I leave Folegandros in a couple of days and return to Parikia. I have noticed that wherever I have stopped–Amorgos, Sikinos, Folegandros…I always seem to find a high vantage point, usually the Chora or a high mountain. I peer north, searching for my lovely home and I see it. Paros. It is there, close at hand. I am thinking like this now. I am somewhat homesick.

I have rented a small car. Today I will take it easy and drive around and take pictures. I saw some areas along the road during the bus ride yesterday that demand attention. Plus, I want to give my feet a rest. No hiking today. Maybe tomorrow and then to a beach. I want to get home, but I am no hurry to get through the day. Plus, at 1PM the sun is far too bright to be of any use to me. I will wait until 3PM or so and head out.

JDCM

Short DoF image of some wall detail on Amorgos

The Aspropounda Lighthouse on Folegandros, looking south

Detail of the door of Episkopi, Sikinos

Detail of some wall work on Folegandros

A kouros statue found on the island of Naxos

Teaching and craft…

By John on May 26, 2013 in beauty, craft, darkroom work, Greece, Paros, silver darkroom, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, working

There is less than a week until our student exhibit at the Aegean Center for the Fine Arts here on Paros. It has been a busy three months for most. Like all previous sessions there is always one or two students who fall away. This spring has been no different. One student left and returned home a few weeks ago. Another has stayed here but has followed a different path from those found on our artistic maps. So be it. There is nothing I can do about either case. I will say, in my own defense, that I was there for both of them in a professional capacity when they needed me and, in the beginning, helped to guide them through some of our philosophies. Their individual decisions to take different routes has no bearing on the Center, the teachers or my own labors.

This spring I was given the honor of filling in as Silver Darkroom instructor. This is not a post I assume to be permanent. All teachers learn that their own skills, craft and knowledge increase when they pass on what they know to others. This has been my experience as well. I have learned more about the art and craft of photography in three months than I thought possible. It was knowledge that I had already accrued so to give it away freely only strengthened my own foundations. It was not review or regurgitation. I found myself solving problems and asking questions of myself from a new point of view. One important lesson is to be able to say “I don’t know. Let’s find the answer together.” What freedom to not suppose, to not be a fake!

There is an ethos to teaching. It is not enough to greet the student, spend a few hours or days, and then set them free. That would be tantamount to showing them a map and telling them to drive to California from New York without first discussing the possible roads west. As the more experienced traveler it is important to guide these eager minds along the way. Yes, let them take a wrong turn, experience a sudden detour or two and even run out of fuel, but do not abandon them in the badlands of inexperience. Let them know that you are there, waiting up ahead at the next marker or traveling alongside. I have practiced this and it has paid off. I have gained a level of patience and understanding by remaining available. I have set up appointments and answered their questions to the best of my abilities, abilities which have grown over the course of three months. To some this may seem a sacrifice of my own personal time, my own independence. It is quite the opposite. I have never felt so free, so happy and, at times, so completely baffled. At that point I turn to someone more knowledgable than myself. Such is the nature of education, or it should be.

There is a quote from George Bernhard Shaw: “Those who can, do…those who can’t, teach.” I must admit that I have found this to be very untrue and can only believe that GBS had his head (beard and all) deeply imbedded in his anus when he thought it up. The quote should be “Those who can, teach.” Learning is a cycle: Practice>Teach>Learn>Practice>Teach>Learn>Practice>Teach>Learn…

Ralph Waldo Emerson had a better idea:

“Be an opener of doors for such as come after thee.”

JDCM

Space and the end of Easter…

By John on May 12, 2013 in beauty, Cyclades stone walls, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, rangefinder camera, skill and craft, spring in the Aegean, working

I just helped a friend board the Blue Star ferry ‘Delos’, en route to Pireaus. It is Sunday evening, May 12, on Paros and the Easter season has ended…finally! The smell of lamb fat has rinsed from my hands, the out-of-towners are returning to their homes and the island is quieting down. I was shocked by the crowds already on board the ‘Delos’ as well as those embarking. Hordes. Masses. All with rolling luggage dragging behind them, seemingly forgotten in some small dusty corner of their minds. Passive traveling at its worst. Why is it that we forget about the items directly behind us and we tend to lead with memories from so long ago ahead as if they are current events? Hmmm…

On the other hand, the Aegean Center students enjoyed a lovely day out at sea with Captain Tassos and his crew for our spring “Boat Trip”, a somewhat circular route around Andiparos, stopping at Despotiko, then Taverna Zombos on the southern side of Andiparos for a mid-afternoon feast: gigantes, kolokithokeftedes, bean salad, xoriatiko salate, calamari, oktopodi salate, saganaki tiri…a true food event. I needed some space, some time alone so I stayed back at the school and worked on my current painting, a view from a balcony overlooking a small courtyard adjacent to the school. I had three hours of quiet for this and I managed to work very well, very hard and productively in that short span. Then I hopped in my trusty FIAT Panda, drove to the Andiparos ferry, went over, swam at both Livadia and Agios Giorgos beaches, took some pictures (film and digital) and met up with the rest of the school for the above-mentioned meal. Orea!

Here is an image from today. A view of Andiparos–Leica M8, Voigtlander 28mm, ISO 160, F/16, 1/125, hyperfocus…

Some walls, a lamp, sea, sky, clouds. Enjoy!

JDCM

Greek Easter, Paros, 2013…

By John on May 3, 2013 in beauty, craft, darkroom work, Greece, Paros, quiet islands, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, Uncategorized, working

There was a time before my time, before the time of my sisters, my parents, my friends…

For some reason this phrase popped in to my head today. For the past few days I have been helping a friend and mentor and her husband move house. It has been an emotional and difficult time for them and I have been honored and humbled to help sort through decades of their life here on Paros, and earlier. We have been separating the wheat from the chaff–a difficult process.

Much of what they wished to save has been in the form of photographs, or more precisely, photographic archives. That is the only way to think of it. Negatives of all sizes, black and white, color, contact sheets, prints. Their time here has been documented and preserved in hard-copy. There was little digital imagery. As I worked I felt something meaningful, truly palpable, while holding a negative up to the light, perusing a contact sheet or carrying an artist’s portfolio bursting with prints. Compared to the lightweight, back-lit digital medium that takes up little space and weighs all but nothing, these items, this archive, made sense to me. Maybe those of us in the digital age have become so accustomed to the ease with which we view, and then delete, images, or page through them via myriad viewing software programs that we are beginning to forget the importance of this process.

My point is that memory, that elusive, ever-changing spirit we carry in our soul, is something that should have weight. It should take up space in our homes. We should, every once in a while, take a photo album or box of negatives off the shelf, dust them off and hold them up to the light of day. As we gaze, we smile. We remember friends long gone or vistas experienced in a way that we cannot when looking at an LED screen or something of that nature. We smile, or we cry. We tell a friend, “Look…here…this is when we…” and then hand them the fragile transparency or piece of paper. We pass on that experience.

We are all repositories of the past. This brings me back to the idea that there was once a time before my time, before the time of those who came before me. I have books as proof, books I can hold. I have folders full of negatives, unprinted. I am accumulating weight in the form of artists portfolios stuffed with prints. I have held them up to the light of day. I say, “Look…here…This is when I…

Happy Easter!

JDCM

News from Paros…a journey of small bites…

By John on March 10, 2013 in 4×5 photography, beauty, craft, Cyclades stone walls, darkroom work, Greece, Paroikia, Paros, quiet islands, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, Uncategorized, working

Lupens blooming along the path to the monastery of Agios Kyriaki

The first week of the spring 2013 session at the Aegean Center has all but ended. As I sit in Pebble’s Jazz Cafe, overlooking the bay of Paroikia, the sun begins a slow descent towards the faint outline of Sifnos to my west. Since my return at the end of January the sunset has moved slowly north along the ridge of that island, the daylight has increased and the temperature has become warmer. There have been welcome harbingers of a lovely spring: warm, breezy with high clouds and only sprinklings of rain, barely enough to dampen my laundry hung out to dry, birds singing in the bright morning…

My work for the next few months has been laid out for me, a buffet of grand proportions. My own large-format portrait work, which I have written about before, takes priority if I wish to have the printing finished by the end of May and the work at the framers by June. This is the beginning-of-the-end of a long-term project, the seeds of which I planted during the winter of 2011/2012. I have two or three more sittings to arrange and then I can begin crossing tasks off the list.

I am also teaching in the darkroom, guiding the bright and eager minds of our small cadre along the meditative paths of silver photography. I have been impressed in this first week by their enthusiasm, previous experience and general attitude towards the idea of ‘slow photography’. I can only hope that they, too, feel as if I am an able mentor for their journey. There are two or three returning students working on the darkroom, which benefits everyone.

The third element is my return to oil painting. I loved it the first time last spring and this time around seems no different. Just today I was working on a piece and I was struck by how much I love oils: their malleability and fluidity, the ability to push them around on a properly prepared canvas…

The fourth menu item this session is a fascinating journey into the world of Johannes Vermeer, more precisely his use of the camera obscura in his work. There are three of us working with Jane Pack and in the next few weeks we will construct a full-scale replica of the master painter’s camera, discover how he applied it and use it ourselves to draw, and then paint, some still lives.

When I realized a few days ago the scope of the labors set before me, my heart and mind quaked. I quickly spoke to an advisor which helped. I know that I can accomplish all of these things, but like a plate of food at the above mentioned buffet, this kind of smorgasbord can seem impossible to consume. Like any dinner, it starts with the first bite. Before I know it will be the end of May and I will be ordering coffee and dessert.

JDCM

Spring unfolds at the Aegean Center for the Fine Arts…

By John on March 4, 2013 in autumn, craft, darkroom work, Greece, Paroikia, Paros, silver darkroom, skill and craft, spiritual journey, spring in the Aegean, Uncategorized, working

The spring session has begun here on Paros at the Aegean Center. The students have mostly all arrived, riding in on the winds and waves. It poured rain all day yesterday and the streets turned into small rivers. By last night the clouds had rolled away and today is sunny and bright. I have many thoughts running through my head, so many raindrops, really, and in many cases just as discarnate. Add them up, however, and they are a flood, a river of their own. I found it comforting to stop thinking. I loaded up some Plus-X, grabbed my tripod and headed down the now undimmed streets of Paroikia. Action, not thinking, always improves my day.

I will be painting again this session. I will also apply the finishing touches on a large format photography project that I began last year, a series of portraits of people I know here on Paros. They are students, ex-pats, local Parians…My Greek barber, Nikos, for instance, as well as the English owner of a local cafe. A motley crew to be sure. I will finish the principle photography and printing in the next three months, bring all the final proofs to Athens and have them matted and framed. I hope to accomplish this before the end of June when I head back to America for a month. When I return in August I will hang the show and open the exhibit. It will be the culmination of my work here at the Center, my Masters Thesis in Photography, if you will. I have no idea where the show will be. I’ll stick my neck out again. So far that hasn’t been the most successful venture here on Paros. I have lost my head more times than not (certainly gaining wisdom) but what choice do I have? “Action and more action…”, as they say…What follows my exhibition is anyone’s guess. I suddenly feel lost at sea with the prospect of September.

I will be assisting again in the darkroom with the students, as I did last fall, so my energies will be focused on their work more than my own. Like the weather moving in circles, alternating rain, sun wind and calm, the Aegean Center is part of the cycle of change. I cannot do much except sit back and trust the process, let the story write itself and accept the results. Once again, to assume anything would be foolish, self-serving and arrogant. As of this morning I am excited to work with five or six (maybe seven) students, some who have never handled silver emulsion and some with more knowledge. We shall see how the session evolves. I remember having many preconceived notions of photography when I arrived here on Paros three years ago. They were soon dashed in favor of a new and vibrant dynamic. As a lotus blossom, spring unfolds…

JDCM

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