Colorful Star Park

Another park in Copenhagen attracts my attention this week. I have been before in this park but during the day, that is why I decided to take a walk during the day so I can get some extra pictures. It´s completely different from any other! It´s about the park located on Frederikssundsvej (Hulgaards Plads to be more precise. Assembled probably after the modernization of the area and the blocks with modern architecture, without the red or orange brick facades of the specific Danish urban landscape but with huge windows and balconies large as half of a room, the park proves overwhelming simplicity. 

 The recipe is simple: you take a not very complicated symbol, in this case a five-pointed star, and do with it everything you can and should exist in a beautiful public place. And here I mean the benches and the tables, the tracing lines, the public lighting and the demarcation between the asphalt and the area with planted trees, and so on. The investment does not seem to be enormous but with very good common sense. 

 The most impressing thing that attracts me to visit the park during the night time was the lightning. The lightning of different colors, with stars projections on the asphalt offers a fairytales view. Next time I´d like to visit the park, it would probably be during a time with lots of snow or thick fog. But until then, I´d be happy with the pictures I have made this time. 

I hope you enjoy it!

Recreation Time ... Norrebro park

        If there is one thing the Danes are very good at is creating new, creative and beautiful outdoor parks for relaxation and enjoying the free time (It has to be like this considering that Danes only 30 hour a week – that’s what EU Labor Force approved for 2011). 

This was confirmed to me once again last weekend, when I took a visit to the new park in Norrebro. Located between Norrebrogade and Tangesvej, the area is now much more colorful. To be honest, I was quite skeptical at first when I saw that it has been started the development of that area, and this because I lived in that neighborhood, 10 meters from the new park (I could see from my apartment window everything what was happening there, including how someone broke in my flat mate’s car, how somebody else made a nice graffiti on my car, how the young guys from this neighborhood always had some problems with the policemen, etc), but my skepticism was (thankfully) wrong. I’m not saying that these things will never happen again, but now if a cop will follow a bad guy who just broke into a car or he had done some illegal things at least they will run in a area with a lot of beautiful colors, with swings and benches with a modern design, with palm trees and other kind of exotically trees, and all this things will make them smile, will make them fell like “home” if we consider the origin of the bad guy who may be from a palm tree country . The same thing with the cop, he will run smiling when he will see the Asiatic or Russian letters, and in his head will pop the amazing experiences from his last trip in one of these countries, or his next vacation. 

But now let’s be serious again and try to see the thematic of this new park. I think you already realized that is about a multinational park with design from a lot of different countries. I didn’t read all the places that this new recreation area covers but some that I remember are USA, Kina, Russia, Iraq, etc. 

One of the strong points is considered the very powerful colors and the same for the rigidity of the park elements. The architect of this park had surely considered the location and that may be the reason of placing the elements as durable as possible. As a minus, that I want to mention, could be the lack of trash bins in the park. At least, there are less than necessary considering the size of the park. Even the existent ones were full or even thrown down with all the garbage scattered over a radius of 1-2 meters. Considering the amount of money invested, they should at least ensure better sanitation. But maybe it was just a coincidence of mine being there at the beginning of the year or during the Russian Christmas, the time when the garbage trucks don’t work.

As a conclusion, I suggest you should visit this park together with your kids, with your life partners or with just your photo camera. That will definitely be a place that I am going to visit more often, next time during the night…I think there can be shouted very beautiful nocturnal urban landscape. But for that I may need some backup with me (some more people, group of friends, maybe). The area seems to be a little dangerous for going all by yourself equipped with cameras.

Bye bye 2011 ... Hello 2012 ... hope you'll kick ass

Enough… Enough…

Enough what?

Enough with always finding a good reason, postponing my first article for this blog. Yes, I know … a little too late for starting a blog; not cool anymore to have one where to promote your hobby … especially a photo blog.

This step is one from my only big thing that I’ve promised myself for this year. I’m not big fan of New Year resolution lists, I even consider it being a cliché over evaluated, but it is still good enough to think of things you want to change or improve in the new coming year. Though, always take care of how much you wish for. Think of too much and you´ll end up doing nothing; think of nothing and you´ll end up being depressive. Every time I have too much on my TO DO list, I end up being disappointed because I cannot do them all.

That is the reason I end up focusing on only ONE GOAL for this new 2012: To become more aware and make myself “visible” in this “online world” from the artistic point of view. Easy! It is considering the many choices one has: such as Flicker, Deviant Art, Online Photo Clubs, Forums, Photo Blogs, Personal Websites (simple or complex ones) and other available specialized websites.

Easy?

Hell no!

Even choosing one of the above mentioned choices, was quite a struggle. That is why I choose to first make an opinion questionnaire and ask my friends in the PhotoCph, the photography group I am quite active in. Hell, again! Just forgot, that the hidden purpose of a questionnaires, in general, is that of confusing you even more. The only difference now, is that I can just count on some numbers: option A … X%, option B … Y%, and so on. 

At the end, I decided to listen to my instinct and try to cover as many options as possible.

Clever!

So, let´s come back to our topic. PhotoBlog! Genius! Will I revolutionize everything I had made until now?

Hell, not!

It’s good to have high standards, but I decided I will not set too many for this one. I decided not to hope too much, but to focus and be grateful for each visitor of this blog, to appreciate and understand every comment (even learn from it), to be happy IF I start getting any comments ;) … but my goal is to remain constant. To remember all the time which my focus is and remain constant on the decisions I took when it comes to the way the reader of this blog will feel, after leaving my page. Satisfied, and inspired!

 Why “PhotoBlog” anyway? I have been using other sources of exposing my artistically projects but I want to also give a story to what I create, not only to attach it on the site. I decided I want to give a story to the projects I start, to add some words to the images I create; and here I do not only refer to a simple explanation of the specific photography but to create the story and express the emotions of the specific art (because, I believe that when you just explain the image when you create it, people may not really understand you as per say).

As I learned from a podcast, the feelings are more important to express, that have much more of impact than the explanation of an image. I may be aware of the fact that it will be quite difficult to satisfy every viewer/visitor of this blog, to what I do. There may be people appreciating both the pictures and the stories, some may appreciate only one of these, and there is the group of people who will just leave, not understanding what I do. But, I want to create this PhotoBlog, trying to express my work the way I see it! Others may see it different, which is why I appreciate comments :).

I am doing this also more for myself, because this is what makes me happy.

I hope you, the reader, will appreciate it, and will inspire you and you´ll like it.

 Thank you!