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Wreath
Last Sunday Catholic church celebrated a “Celebration of flesh and blood of the Lord” which is a celebration related to Eucharist. On this occasion we always get a little wreath made of fresh green leaves in the local church and though I actually need to ask what it symbolises, I love its structure and freshness. It inspired me this year to try and take a few photos with it, these are the ones I liked best. As the wreath actually gets dry quite quickly, I’m pleased I’ll have something to look at and remember. The freshness, the feelings, the spiritual mood. There is no need to explain what “Bible” means…
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Organic
Kim Klassen asked us in one of her Be still 52 lessons what we think of when we hear the word “organic” and I thought of opening an English dictionary to find out the exact interpretation as the Czech and English meaning might not have been the same… When I read the following definition… organic – (of food, farming methods, etc.) produced or practised without using artificial chemicalsorganic cheese/vegetables/wine, etc. an organic farmer/gardener organic farming/horticulture …I knew right away I’d love to shoot cheese. I’ve chosen Gouda with herbs which we buy in a specialised shop from time to time. It’s a bit more expensive but truly delicious. You can…
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Laundry time
I’ve already mentioned the task we got in the Be still 52 course, to try and capture quiet non-stylised real-life moments. We even got a few prompts to help us focus on a particular topic, one of them being “Laundry Time”. Well, there are many possibilities to capture that and I went for shooting our washed towels, dish towels and tablecloths hanging on the washing lines in our garden. Nothing was specifically arranged for the photo and I count this as a still life photo though as you can see, the pieces were moving in a breeze… The first photo is just basically adjusted, the other two images are further…
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Milk and cookies
How much fun do you think you would have shooting milk and cookies? When I read that assignment in the Be still 52 course I’m participating in and saw the images Kim created, I felt eager to give it a try. So many possibilities… I decided to arrange my props outside, as the morning light was so nice, and also I decided to add lilacs into the background as they were in full bloom all around and were complementing nicely the cookies I bought for this occasion. I tried different depth of field, different perspectives, cookies whole and partly eaten… and eventually also a different format of the final images.…
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Peony and other beauties
Quite a few years ago I planted a little tree peony bush (Paeonia suffruticosa) in our garden. I bought it in a garden centre because I liked the picture of its pink flowers presented on a label and based on described growing conditions, I decided the peony could grow happily here. It did and though they say the plant doesn’t tolerate replanting easily, it even survived when we needed to move it into a different part of the garden. It doesn’t grow way too quickly but every spring it is covered with impressive buds and then flowers which I’ll never grow tired of being looking at. In autumn those beautiful…
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Shining through
There is a low sideboard in my kitchen which separates the space where meals are prepared and cooked from the space where the meals are eaten and I like to have a pot with herbs or a vase with flowers placed on it as it looks quite charming. There is also a window near the sideboard which looks westwards. Sometimes, when the sun is quite low in the evening and it still shines, its rays get into the kitchen and shine through the leaves and flowers I have displayed on the sideboard and it’s always very beautiful. I sit at the table having my supper and watching the beauty… A…
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Spring wandering
Every year, when cherry trees open their beautiful white flowers and enchant me with their charm, I feel compelled to go and capture the beauty. Last year I missed that occasion which doesn’t last very long but this year I took advantage of a nice weekend afternoon and asked my husband to go with me to the cherry tree orchard situated near our village. I intended to take a few captures there and go home but my husband took advantage of that stroll to get much further and eventually we explored the surroundings of our village much more thoroughly. The following photo was taken just at the beginning of the…
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Nature in my garden
Another task to be accomplished in the “Be still 52” course was to take a walk and find some props provided by nature along the way. I didn’t make it to the woods but I took scissors and a bowl and headed for our garden to find some nature beauty there. My garden didn’t disappoint me and I gathered some branches, flowers, bark and pebbles for my photography. I even found an old wooden surface in the yard and an old ugly board which made a great background so this time I was shooting outside, in the shadow of our old barn. I created several versions and modifications with the…
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Detour
When returning home from Křivoklát, we stopped for a while by a group of buildings we noticed along the way and which arose our curiosity. We found out that the complex represents a regional museum and gallery Mariánská Týnice which has been placed in the premises of a former Cistercian pilgrimage destination. When I read that the museum was opened in 1952, I wasn’t much surprised as the fifties, having been under the communist rule, were quite unfavourable to religious orders and religion generally. On the other hand, the buildings were preserved in this way and that’s valuable. It is noteworthy that the church and the provost office were built…
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Easter outing
Though Easter cold and rainy weather forecast did not seem favourable for outings, we wanted to make one and decided to visit an Easter market at the castle Křivoklát. Frankly, I don’t like crowded places like such a market much but I had never been to Křivoklát, which is one of the oldest (more than 900 years since the first written reference) and most important castles of Bohemian kings, and this seemed to be a good opportunity to change that. When we arrived at Křivoklát, there were even more cars and people than I expected as we made an effort to get there soon enough but eventually it didn’t matter…
