Seniors magazine Pleine Vie asked Paul Smit to write a new article to his stock photos of the Lago Maggiore. For a foreigner (Paul is Dutch but moved to France) it is not easy to penetrate the French market. So when France's largest monthly (circulation of a million) asks you for a job like this, it means: welcome in France!
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The separate Weekend edition of Flemish news magazine Knack has published the feature Wolf People in Sheep's Clothing by Mick Palarczyk. It shows what a wonderful new travel destination was added to the map of the European Union today, following the entry of Romania.
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I can see people clambering up the steep mountain meadows everywhere I look. Shepherds with their herds, singing children, horse carts. Enormous baskets of food, carried by women so short and squat that they seem to be dwarf folk. Everyone climbs, ploddingly, up the mountain, like the sea turtles who for millions of years have been climbing up the same beach to lay their eggs every year. I realise how intensely happy these people must be. How fantastic it is to be able to gather on a high meadow for a century-old ritual on this beautiful spring morning.
Excerpt from Romania: Wolf people in sheep's clothing by Mick Palarczyk.
Nowhere in Europe daily life is as authentic as in Romania's countryside. Gipsy girls wear the traditional black, the original headgear was never abandoned and festivities are still connected to the rhythm of the harvests and not to the schedules of the tourists. Now Romania has entered the European Union this authenticity will disappear slowly but certainly. And maybe the unusual kindness and hospitality of the people as well. That's why now is the moment to explore the youngest member state of the European Union. (Photos Mick Palarczyk).
These pictures are part of the feature Wolf People in Sheep's Clothing.
Romania passes an important obstacle and will gallop into the European Union next month. This is generating a lot of negative publicity, but the good thing is we'll be getting a new European travel destination. In many ways the most authentic destination, as folk culture hasn't degenerated into folklore yet, and the flu is still being suppressed with herbs.
Maramures, Moldavia and Transylvania are regions which have retained an almost medieval simplicity and beauty. In secluded valleys bordered by the Carpathian Mountains and shaded by clouds of plum blossom lie villages with wooden churches and houses where ancient rituals, festivities, clothes and crafts are cherished. To educate this illiterate people the outer walls of late medieval monastic churches were covered with colourful religious frescoes. A very kind people with an amazing sense of hospitality.
What makes our co-operation with Voyage special is that we supply our digital images in exactly the needed sizes and output-sharpened to suit the wishes of this glossy magazine. All this after having received the exact lay-out, made using our original slides. This working method has advantages for both sides. The magazine saves on costs, while we as photographers remain responsible for the final quality of the pictures, like the exact croppings and the way the colours of the pictures relate to each other. It leads to the best possible lay-out, making the designer happy. And we are happy as well, since we have a say in the final results.
Click here to see the complete feature as photographed and written by Paul Smit.
Qui Touring, published by Touring Club Italiano and Italy's largest travel magazine, selected exactly those photos that photographer Mick Palarczyk found most striking. The cathedral of old beach trees on the cover, pictured during a drizzle, shows that you don't always need beautiful weather to take a beautiful photograph. With the non-intrusive lay-out and maize-yellow as supporting colour - which doesn't show in the photo - Qui Touring sets quite an example in cover design. The lane of trees returns in the opening spread. It's a different shot, where the hiker is even smaller amidst the giants that are as alive as they are old. Apparently it was this that led the editor to the title.
To read excerps of Jeannette van Ditzhuijzen's supporting text, please click here.
A child enjoys the view from the back of a giant. The Colosso di San Carlone from 1698, a huge copper statue of a canonized member of the powerful Borromeo family, overlooks the slopes along the Lago Maggiore near Arona in Italy, and blesses the landscape. As an ordinary mortal you can view the world through his holy eyes if you climb the narrow stairs leading up into his head. (Photos Paul Smit).
These photos are part of the feature Lago Maggiore.
A home game, because Leiden is Paul Smit's home town. In this city walk fun shops, restaurants and cafes are reported on as well as cultural hot spots. The feature is enlivened with small historical vignettes. Leiden, where Rembrandt is born and has lived for 23 years, is easily the most beautiful city in the Netherlands, and after Amsterdam has the largest historical centre. This has attracted many antique shops, allowing the city to develop into a veritable magnet for lovers of all that is timeworn. Thanks to the presence of the country's largest university, Leiden is also effervescent with social events.
The Belgian magazine Knack Weekend was fascinated by the colour red, which nowhere you will see more often than in China, certainly around New Year. Red became the visual Leitmotiv of this feature about some lesser known regions of southern China. The alien from the title is photographer/journalist Mick Palarczyk; sometimes he felt like a visitor from outer space when he encountered people that had never seen a westerner before.
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How long did it take to grow all that hair?" Antillian Roland Joe, better known as Ras Bushman, smiles. "Already as a youth I wanted to be a Rastafarian. Since then no hairdresser was allowed to touch my scalp, of course." You can enjoy his hairdo in Philipsburg, on the island of St. Maarten, where he runs the vegetarian restaurant Freedom Fighters Ital Shack. All the food is home grown and tastes really good. Ras is a musician as well, but he has retired from the band Freedom Fighters he founded. His son has taken over. Often you hear their reggae sound coming out of the shack. (Photos Mick Palarczyk).
These pictures are part of the feature Netherlands Antilles: Saba, St. Eustatius and St. Martin.
"Around Dresden" is a wintry exploration of the area around Saxony's capital.
Dresden received special attention the last two years due to the completion of the Frauenkirche, followed in 2006 by the town's 800th anniversary. Now the dust has settled and winter draws near we take time to have a closer look at the surroundings of Dresden.
Most prominent is the Elbe Valley, a stretch of castles and palaces along the river, in 2004 added to the list of UNESCO world heritage sites. Our scenic drive starts in porcelain city Meissen with a story about two inventions. Both took place in the Albrechtsburg castle: porcelain and the ribless cellular vault. The exploration ends in Zittau, near the spot where Germany, Poland and Czechia meet, with an amazing story about the Lent Cloth. On the way we visit walled Bautzen, meet artist Franz Gruss and his prehistoric animals and hike in the Elbsandsteingebirge with its table mountains and national park.
For the Italian magazine Weekend & Viaggi I adapted my existing text to fit their wishes: they wanted a purely cultural-historical story. Therefore my travels through Saxony and Thuringia became an exploration of the land of Goethe, Luther and Bach.
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Our climb to the Cader Idris begins in a luscious forest. While we are taking a break we are passed by a group of plucky old men, who berate us youngsters: “Not even out of the forest yet and resting already?!” Not much later it is our turn to pass them, clearly getting ready for a break of their own. “Gentlemen, only just out of the forest and resting already?” The oldest, with the unmistakable appearance of a lord, points at his watch and corrects me: “Tea break.” He takes a flowery porcelain teacup from his bag, followed by the saucer and a thermos. In response to our surprised looks, he says: “Don’t think we are fatigued. We are just upholding our culture. The empire may have fallen, but we still stick to our tea.”
Excerpt from Back to Snowdonia, about the Welsh national park.
Dutch historical cities are known for their brown cafés and Rembrandt's native town Leiden is no exception. One I really like is Café De Bontekoe. It was designed around 1900 as a butcher shop and is still decorated with tiles painted in the style of the Haagse School showing Dutch landscapes and cows. This venue is mostly frequented by creative forty-somethings, who deal with their midlife crises. (Photo Paul Smit).
This picture is part of the feature Leiden.
Do you know a kayaker's paradise where you hardly meet another kayaker? Where one moment you paddle among water birds flying up and the next between churches and palaces? Where you sleep in a canal house the first night and have a whole island to yourself the second? It exists: Venice and its lagoon. Kanu Magazin from Germany, Europe's largest journal on kayaking, published the story.
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The master alchemist had boasted to August the Strong, King of the Saxons, that he could make gold. “Go for it,” August said and supplied him with all the equipment he needed…and a dungeon as his laboratory. August deemed isolation the safest way to ensure the alchemist would under no circumstance reveal his working methods to others.
Excerpt from The Irony of History, about the region around Dresden.
After building for twelve years, the jewel was put back in the crown of Dresden's skyline with the inauguration of the Frauenkirche in October 2005. That was headline news. But during recent years more great architecture has seen the light in Dresden, that celebrates its 800th birthday this year. The Kunsthof Passage in the hip Neustadt quarter, for instance. It's an explosion of architectural creativity, like here in the Hof der Elemente (Courtyard of the Elements). This façade makes music when it rains. (Photo Paul Smit).
This picture is part of the feature Around Dresden.
Voyage, an Italian travel glossy, emphasized the geological strangeness of the Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness in my story In Search of The Wave.
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"What's up?" We explain to the park ranger that we are on our way to Paria Canyon in the Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness Area; 65 more bumpy kilometres to go. "Will the road ahead be okay for our car?" He walks around the Sedan, tugging at his beard as he considers the matter. Then he lovingly places his hand on the bonnet. "If it's your own car, don't do it. If it's a rental, beat it up!"
This is an excerpt from In Search of the Wave.
