I loved these two. One can imagine how many years they have been together. They probably have some quite interesting stories to tell. But not to each other.

It’s those little moments sometimes…

Last Sunday I discovered this little old tea room strolling through Shoreditch with a friend. I had passed this place so many times – but never went in – until that day. I had a tea with the intrigiung name “Russian Caravan”.

The owner told me I should come back on Thursday when they would have a live jazzy swing band playing. So i did. And of course I took my camera along. I really felt like I travelled back in time. Most people were dressed up like in the olden days. The DJ played the tunes from the Golden Twenties to which the peole danced along to. I totally loved it. The 1920s are my favourite decade. I’d so much love to go back to Berlin back in those days – and that night I felt that dream of mine had come true for a short while.

The place is called “Time for Tea” in Shoreditch, London. They have a Facebook group under the name of “Time for Tea Shoreditch”.

Check it out to find more about future events like this one. You won’t regret going there if you like a bit of  time traveling or just a good cuppa.

There will be many more photos coming up. So watch this space.

And here is another one. A drive from California to New York in the length of a song. Genius. I so need a vintage convertible now.

I recently bought myself a time-lapse remote control for my Camera, because I – as you might have guessed it – want to do some time-lapse projects.

Here I think is one that sets the bench mark literally sky high.

Nasa documented one of their last space shuttle launches using that technique. All I can say is: Wow!

Shame they didnt put any music on it though as it would have made an even bigger impact I think.

 

I only recently learned about the artist called JR. I must have been blind or totally in a different universe that I haven’t seen his work before, because when you look at the size of his images than you literally have to be blind or in another universe to miss them.

He is loved and respected for his superlarge portraits of people that he posts in street art style on buildings of Parisian slums, on walls in the Middle East, on broken bridges in Africa or in favelas in Brazil.

It is not the size of the images alone though that make his work so outstanding. It is the people he portrais and also the specific places where he post them.

He first became well known when he photographed young people of the Parisian suburbs notorious for crime and anti-social behaviour. By glueing their images in XL-size across the bourgeois Paris city centre he brought their human side closer to the rest of the city who normally would distance themselves from their un-welcomed neighbours.

One of the most powerful projects he has done in my view was his “Face2Face” installations which is by some regarded as the biggest illegal photo exhibition ever. In 2007 he posted huge portraits of Israelis and Palestinians face to face in eight Palestinian and Israeli cities, and on both sides of the massive security fence barrier that seperates the two communities.

I love that project. Showing these people who are so bitterly divided by their historic and religious disbutes next to each other on photos pulling funny faces had something so disarming and unifying.

 

He recently won the TED-Prize which granted him £100.000 to spend on a project of his choice. If you don’t know TED yet then please check it out. It is a magnificient project that is dedicated to spread knowledge about the most incredible ideas, inventions and projects by some of the most exceptional individuals on this planet.

On of them is definitely JR. As part of the TED-prize-project he invited the whole world to participate in his latest photo initiative “Inside Out”. If you have a camera, a gallery space or even just a wall and want to tell a visual story about the people in your city, neighbourhood or community then you are most welcomed to take part.

Read all about it here:  www.tedprize.org

If you want to know more about the artist JR himself then click here: www.jr-art.net

Or watch this brilliant video where he looks back and forward on his projects.

TED Prize Winner JR & INSIDE OUT from TED Prize on Vimeo.

 

 

And you can get more info and incredible videos of TED here – seriously I highly recommend it – you will be inspired: www.ted.com

And here some more of JR’s remarkable photographs:

 

Looks like I’m on a roll with these guys. It’s always the same though, once you’ve started looking for them, you’ll see Faces in Places everywhere. 🙂