QUITO ECUADOR – We’re back in Quito getting ready for the flight home. I woke up early to capture the city waking up in lovely light. The man near the center of the frame is wheeling his shoeshine stand toward Plaza de La Indepenencia where he will set it up for the day.
Shoe shine man
Leica M9 with 28mm Summicron
CAYAMBE ECUADOR – This town hosts a week-long festival for Pacha Mama (Mother Earth) and Taita Inti (Father Sun) around the summer solstice. This guy’s costume bears no relationship to the prevailing native garb at this festival – he probably looked as odd to the Ecuadorians as he does to us. His mask looks like it was made from a child’s bib, but on close examination it’s actually finely beaded. He’s sufficiently odd that I’ve adopted him in the header for my site.
Cayambe festival
Leica M9 with 28mm Summicron.
SAN PABLO DEL LAGO ECUADOR – The cemetery near the Hacienda Cusin, a lovely inn.
Leica M9 with 24mm Summilux.
ECUADOR – I’m back tired after a long day of shooting, with limited internet access. I thought that I should post a photo from today – I’ll update the post with further information when I have a better connection.
Leica M9 with 35mm Summicron Asph.
HACIENDA ZULETA, ECUADOR – We visited Hacienda Zuleta a few hour drive north of Quito.
I’ve paraphrased the history of the hacienda from its web site. In the late 16th century, King Charles gave the Zuleta region to the Jesuits, who implemented Spanish methods of farming and cattle and sheep production. In the following years a small wool mill was established. And by 1691, the Hacienda house, granary and chapel were completed and the farm was in full operation. In 1713 the property was confiscated and transferred to Canon Gabriel Zuleta, making Zuleta his seventeenth hacienda. The farm became known as Cochicaranqui de Zuleta. After the Canon’s death the farm passed to the Posse family,who restored the hacienda back to its 17th century grandeur. The estate was sold to Jose Maria Lasso in 1898 and passed through two generations to its current owner, Galo Plaza Lasso, the ex-President of Ecuador.
We attended the feast of San Juan at the hacienda – this is Mr. Plaza Lasso catching an offering from a local village.
Chicken offering
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
QUITO ECUADOR – Baptismal in the Iglesia de San Roque, Quito. Built in 1596 and extensively renovated in the 20th Century.
Iglesia de San Roque
Leica M9 and 24mm Summilux.
QUITO ECUADOR – The space above the a side isle in the Basilica del Voto Nacional in Quito. Wikipedia includes the following description:
“The basilica is the most important work of Neogothic Ecuadorian architecture and is one of the most representative of the Americas. It is the largest neogothic basilica in the New World. The building is noted for its grotesques in the form of native Ecuadorian animals, such as armadillos, iguana, and Galapagos tortoises.
“The Basilica is 140 meters long and 35 meters wide. It is 30 meters high in the sanctuary, 15 meters high in the votive chapels, 74 meters high in the transept, and 115 meters high in the two frontal towers. In the sanctuary, there are 14 bronze images representing 11 apostles and three evangelists. In the crypt, there is a pantheon containing the remains of several heads of state.”
Leica M9 and 50mm Sumicron Asph. Three images stitched.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – This was a travel day, starting in the morning at LaGuardia and ending the day in Quito, Ecuador, via Miami. This out of the window of a taxi on the way to LaGuardia. The Bridge is the Triborough Bridge – at least that’s its historical name and what most New Yorkers call it. It was officially renamed the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge in 2008. Here’s a short excerpt from the Wikipedia entry on the bridge:
“Construction had begun on Black Friday in 1929, and the Triborough project’s outlook began to look bleak. Othmar Ammann’s assistance was enlisted to help simplify the structure. Ammann had collapsed the original two-deck roadway into one, requiring lighter towers, and thus, lighter piers. These cost-saving revisions saved $10 million on the towers alone. Using New Deal money, the project was resurrected in the early 1930s by Robert Moses and the bridge was opened to traffic on July 11, 1936.”
Here’s a link to the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s page on the bridge: RFK Bridge
RFK Bridge
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Maria’s passport picture. We needed photographs for visa applications for Brazil, Kenya and Tanzania for a trip that we’re planning for August.
Nicon D700 with Nikon 85mm f1.4 lens and an on-camera flash.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A walk in the East Village in the evening of the longest day of the year.
East Village
Leica M9 with 35mm Summichron Asph
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Dinner at Bar Boulud with some old friends and our son and daughter, who took me there for Fathers Day. This is a silly made-up holiday designed to promote greeting card sales, but I have nonetheless promoted it to our children as the most important day of the year.
Dinner at Bar Boulud
Nikon D700 AND Nikon 85mm f1.4 lens.
WARREN, CONNECTICUT – Perennial boarder. We bought our house in Warren in 1987. It was a split level ranch on a cornfield. We’ve added bits and pieces to the landscape over the years – it’s a delight that our efforts finally look like mature landscape.. It would be an exaggeration to say that we’ve had a master plan, but we have pursued a general direction, leaning toward the use of native plants in naturalized settings. We’ve planted one perennial boarder, however, that’s an exception.
Perennial boarder
Leica M9 and 50mm Summilux Asph
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I spent the late afternoon stalking reflected sunlight out the window of our dining room.
Out my window
Hasselblad H3D with HC 300 lens.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Midday found me in midtown on my way to a lunch date. Here’s one of my favorite spots, the plaza in front of the Seagram Building.
Seagram Building New York
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS – Up early to prepare for meetings, I made this panorama of sunrise over Boston harbor. I’ve written elsewhere that I don’t have much use for photographs of sunrises and sunsets, They do, after all, happen every day: its unlikely that I or anyone else is going to create great or unusual work by pointing a camera east in the early morning. I doubt that any artist since Joseph Mallord William Turner has made much of a contribution to our understanding or appreciation of sunrises and sunsets. I’ve pasted a copy of Turner’s Sunrise with Sea Monsters below.
One also has to consider the burden at this time of year of getting up very early to photograph a sunrise: sunrise today in Boston was at 5:06. That’s actually why I’ve posted a sunrise – I had a very busy day in Boston so I got up early to capture my image for the day. The first frame of this image was time stamped by the camera as 10:00:50 because I set the clock in all of my cameras to UTC so I don’t have to worry about whether they are on correct local time when I travel.
Sunrise Boston Harbor
Leica M9 plus 35mm Summicron Asph.
Turner Sunrise with Sea Monsters
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS – I made my monthly trip to Boston. Here’s a facade of a building that proudly announces its address as 289 Devonshire Street.
Link to Google map
289 Devonshire Street, Boston
Leica M9 with 35mm Summicron Asph. Three frames stitched.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Back home. The Lipstick building.
Lipstick building
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – Day six in Mustique. A travel day back to New York. This from the Mustique airport.
Mustique airport
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – Day five in Mustique. The extended house party continues!
Judy and Doug
Nikon D700 and 85mm Nikkor F1.4
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – Day four in Mustique. The celebration continues at Basil’s Bar. Here’s a link to Basil’s Bar.
Basil's Bar, Mustique
Nikon D700 and 85mm Nikkor f1.4 lens.
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – Day three in Mustique. This is the day of the wedding that brought us down here. Here’s a guest stalking the bride and groom at the ceremony:
Stalker
Nikon D700 with Nikkor 85mm f1.4 lens.
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – Day two in Mustique. A picnic and party at Macaroni Beach. We dodged rain showers all afternoon – the scene had a Last Year at Marienbad quality. Wikipedia entry for Last Year at Marienbad
Macaroni Beach Mustique
Leica M9 with 50mm Summilux Asph. Two frames stitched.
MUSTIQUE, ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES – We traveled today to Mustique to attend the celebrations surrounding the wedding of friends. We arrived in time for dinner and a kick off party. We were last in Mustique in January of this year. My last trip to Mustique As I’ve noted before this is a private island in the Grenadines populated primarily by the rich and famous. Here’s a link to it’s Wikipedia entry: Mustique’s Wikipedia entry. Anyway, from evening one:
Party at Yamanjá
Taken with a Nikon D700 with an 85mm f1.4 Nikkor.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A very busy day as I prepare to go to Mustique tomorrow. I caught this view of Citicorp with my Leica on my way to a lunch date.
Citicorp Center
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Back from Connecticut and a rainy weekend. I had spent the weekend putting a relatively new (to me) camera through its paces, a Nikon D700. I plan on using the D700 primarily for available light photograph in poor light, so I’ve put it back in its bag to wait for the next party, wedding, dinner or whatever. For street use I’m back to my trusty Leica M9, which I prefer as long as there’s enough light to manually focus. This picks up on my “Look up – don’t worry of it makes you look like a tourist” theme.
Lexington Avenue and 93rd Street
Leica M9 and 35mm Summicron Asph.
WARREN, CONNECTICUT – We spent most of the day in Woodbury Connecticut fighting local traffic and running from one antique store to the next. Not a lot of terrific photo opportunities – the bright overcast produced flat, unattractive, light. We returned to Warren in the late afternoon and I captured this of a bush rose.
Rose
Nikon D700 with 85mm f1.4 lens,
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I spent a few hours today getting to know some new equipment. Most of the images on this blog are taken with a Leica M9, which has the advantage of sensational image quality but is very much a traditional Leica. The manual rangefinder focus and limited high ISO capacity has presented issues for me in poor light like Martha McPhee’s book party. I also shoot Hasselblad digital medium format, but it’s unwieldy at parties and events. I’ve been experimenting with a Nikon D700 and fast prime lenses for parties and events – this is the new (to me) equipment that that I referred to above. This is a torture test for lens flare but I liked the image well enough to post it. An Andrew Moore photograph, a Venini ice cream glass, a Venetian candle stick form 1914 or so and a Deruta cachepot.
Link to Andrew Moore
Link to Venini
Link to Deruta
Andrew Moore and Murano Glass
Nikon D700 and Nikon 35mm f2.0 lens.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – We went to a party for Martha McPhee’s new book Dear Money. Here’s a link to the book on Amazon: Dear Money
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – While walking on East 68th Street today I stumbled on a fashion shoot in progress – probably for a catalogue based on the wardrobe.:
Catalogue shoot, East 68th Street
Hasselblad H3D 39 with HC 100 lens.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – This from the very early evening on Park Avenue. The sculpture is newly-installed. I don’t have any information on it but I’ll keep looking and revise this post accordingly. Of course the background is Mies van der Rohe’s Seagram Building, one of the icons that I stalk. The perspective is from the front door of the Racquet and Tennis Club.
Park Avenue Island
Shot with a Hasselblad H3D 39 and an HC 100 lens. Three exposures stitched. This produces a very large file.
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