Keith Moul – Borderlands Photos

/in

Keith Moul
Borderlands Photos

Keith Moul likes to drive around and stop at anything interesting. If there is space at the side of the road, he’ll stop (and sometimes on an isolated road in its middle). He processes the shot in Photoshop, without ever changing the content, but only to sharpen, contrast and provide maximum saturation (to his eye) depending on the subject.

Damrak Bikepath, Amsterdam, Keith Moul, photograph, 2018

Landscape with Arizona and US Flags, Keith Moul, photograph, 2018

Japantown, San Francisco, Keith Moul, photograph, 2018.

Bryan R. Monte – Rijksmusem Tower Watchmen

/in

Bryan R. Monte
Rijksmuseum Tower Watchmen

Bryan R. Monte always tries to take a camera with him when he goes into Amsterdam. Over the last decade, he has amassed a collection of over 1,000 photographs of the city, and especially its art and culture, including artwork in some of its museums’ permanent and special collections. The photo below of the north and west sides of the Rijksmuseum clock tower was taken in June 2013 with a hand-held, Canon Powershot SX130 IS with a focal length of 25,715, F stop 5 and an 1/160 exposure.

Bryan R. Monte Rijksmuseum Tower Watchmen, photograph, 2013

Nina Ascoly and bart plantenga – Amsterdam Photos

/in

Nina Ascoly and bart plantenga
Amsterdam Photos

Nina Ascoly takes photos of plants, nature, and daughter Paloma to relax and to escape the stress of working for an international environmental organization.

bart plantenga is the author of novels Beer Mystic, Radioactivity Kills, and Ocean GroOve, short story collection Wiggling Wishbone, novella Spermatogonia: The Isle of Man, and wander memoirs Paris Scratch and New York Sin Phoney in Face Flat Minor. His books, YODEL-AY-EE-OOOO: The Secret History of Yodeling Around the World, Yodel in Hi-Fi, plus the CD Rough Guide to Yodel, have created the misunderstanding that he’s the world’s foremost yodel expert. He’s also a DJ and has produced Wreck This Mess since 1986. He lives in Amsterdam. He is currently working on a photo exhibition called ‘The Cone Brothers: Respecting the Unspoken Authority of the Traffic Cone’, featuring a selection of his and daughter Paloma’s 400 cone photos.

bart plantenga, photos l. & r.  & Nina Ascoly, photo center,  IJ Triptych, photographs, 1996

Ascoly and plantenga used a 1984 Canon XA2 compact camera with a 35 mm 1:3.5-4-element lens. The triptych above was taken from the windows of a squat located between the Silo and Stenenhoofd public space to the northwest and the Centraal Station to the southeast. The building was razed 15 years ago. It was just north of the present-day IJdok peninsula, which now includes hotels and a courthouse. The photograph below was taken with the same camera along the Prins Hendrikkade in Amsterdam.

bart plantenga, Floating Amsterdam, photograph, 2010

Demi Anter – A Different Kind of Red

/in

Demi Anter
A Different Kind of Red

Demi Anter writes: ‘I began photographing as a means to document my other artworks, often ephemeral in nature. I quickly fell in love with the art form. Since moving to Europe, shooting on film has become an almost daily ritual that helps me feel awake to the world around me. This photo was taken on 35mm film with my Pentax K1000 in December of 2018, while I travelled alone to Amsterdam in order to get my first tattoos. The city in winter gave me equal doses of wonder and melancholy. This photo is an instance of wonder — oddity and delight — with thanks due to my best travel companion, the camera.’

Demi Anter, A Different Kind of Red, photograph, 2018

Jury S. Judge – Saturated Colours

/in

Jury S. Judge
Saturated Colours

Jury S. Judge writes: ‘My photographs, Diaphanous and If You Love Yellow, This Is For You, were both taken with my Canon EOS Rebel T3i. I captured both images using a shutter speed of 1/80 of second and at an F-Stop of f/5.6. My cell phone served as an illuminated light source in the background, which set the delicate flowers aglow with bold colours. These pieces are both celebrations of the simplicity of vividly saturated colours and the exquisite, timeless beauty of plant life. I enjoy when small-scale subjects such as flower petals are magnified by camera lens, and become elevated to art.’

Diaphanous, Jury S. Judge, photograph, 2018.

If You Love Yellow, This Is For You, Jury S. Judge, photograph, 2018

Bob Ward – Young Jeremiah Gains

/in

Bob Ward
Young Jeremiah Gains

Young Jeremiah Gains, Carte de visite, Leeds, UK, photographer unknown, 1884

We are able to see what ordinary people in late-Victorian times looked like due to the popularity of what was known as a ‘Carte de visite’. Portraiture no longer the privilege of the rich, it had become possible to get photographed in one of the many studios available. The product was about the size of a playing card, just right for circulating among friends or adding to the family album. Although subsequently displaced by the postcard print that could be mailed, it was the arrival of the Box Brownie camera at the beginning of the 20th century that brought real change. Simple to use, everyone could now take pictures in their own settings, away from the make-believe backdrops provided by the studios.

Bob Ward – Two Signatures

/in

Bob Ward
Two Signatures

Bob Ward is a contributor of poetry, an essay, and photographs to Amsterdam Quarterly. He discovered this indenture document of Benjamin Gains, a distant but direct relative, folded up and tucked away in the corner of a family Bible. He photographed the document using a Canon 20D SLR fitted with a 50mm macro lens in natural light and no flash to prevent damage. This document is now stored in the West Yorkshire County Archive, which will ensure its preservation.

Bob Ward, Two Signatures, photograph, 2005

Unknown Photographer – The Belding Family Reunion

/in

Unknown Photographer
The Belding Family Reunion

Jennifer Clark writes about the photograph’s origin: ‘The Belding Family Reunion is a family photo that was taken in 1909 in Belding, Michigan by an unknown photographer. A number of people within the photo have been identified by my soon to be 90-year-old father, Joseph Engemann. The photo’s porch setting is the former home of my great-great-grandmother, Theresa Spaeth Martin, who was born in Germany 1835, came to America in 1851, and who died about eight years after this photograph was taken’.

Photographer unknown, The Belding Family Reunion, photograph, circa 1909

Jury S. Judge – Rubble of the Holy

/in

Jury S. Judge
Rubble of the Holy

Jury S. Judge writes that: ‘as an artist, I create art to express myself in the pictorial language of light, colour, and linear forms. I enjoy blending traditional and digital mediums within my art because I find this combination to be a versatile method of self-expression. Through my photography, I enjoy capturing the natural beauty of my home state, Arizona, as well as the other destinations where my adventures lead me. Rubble of The Holy features the hexagonal basalt columns of Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland. The camera I shoot with is a Canon. This photograph, however, was taken with a Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge.’

Jury S. Judge, Rubble of the Holy, photograph, 2017

Jayne Marek – Textures of Earth and Water

/in

Jayne Marek
Textures of Earth and Water

Jayne Marek feels that her ‘designs should be balanced — not set in the centre, necessarily, but using well-distributed optical elements. I use mostly natural subject matter to achieve visual ambiguities, often through abstraction, to explore how objective reality can be perceived in multiple ways. I also emphasize designs by using bright or unexpected colours and by experimenting with exposures. Readers can take a closer look and enjoy patterns or shapes that might otherwise go unnoticed’. A Nikon Coolpix set at ISO 400 and 64 respectively was used for the first two photos. A Nikon D90 at ISO 200 was used for the last. None used flash.

Birch Oracle, Jayne Marek, photograph, May 2009

Colorblock Reflections, Jayne Marek, photograph, March 2011

Candy Pebbles, Jayne Marek, photograph, March 2012