We saw a little bit of Chicago despite the massive snowstorm that blanketed the city and dashed our hopes of making it to New York tomorrow. Big thanks to the Violet Hour for the great event and tasty drinks.
We’ve been on the road all week for a series of StudioBooth events to promote the new HBO show, How to Make it in America and were fortunate enough to have a few days off in San Francisco. We caught up with some friends, ate a lot of good food and took an amazing drive through Marin and out to Point Reyes.
StudioBooth made its first journey abroad to represent PUMA at Bread & Butter in Berlin. Even though it was really cold and we were working most of the time, we made sure to eat our share of wienerschnitzel and currywurst, drink lots of tasty German beer and get a glimpse of what this exciting city has to offer. Check out the full gallery here.
A selection of pics taken with the very cool Shakeit iPhone app on our recent trip to Rome.
After a week in Cairo, we decided to see what else Egypt had to offer and headed to the Western Desert. We woke up at dawn and took a five hour taxi ride from Cairo to the Bahariya Oasis, where we met up with our two guides, Mahmoud and Mahmoud. We spent the next three days off-roading in a Toyota Landcruiser through some of the most spectacular scenery I’ve ever seen. We camped out under the stars and were treated to delicious meals cooked over an open fire. Our guides were quite fond of the hashish and we spent each night smoking, drinking tea and listening to them play traditional Bedouin music. It was a truly unforgettable experience.
On one of our last days in Egypt we decided to get out of Cairo and visit Alexandria. The famous port is Egypt’s second city and had been continuously inhabited since Alexander the Great founded it in 334 BC. While still a busy Egyptian city, it is a much more pleasant place to visit than Cairo. It has a distinctly Mediterranean feel and the sea breeze keeps the smog and heat under control. One of the highlights of our visit was the newly built Bibliotheca Alexandrina which is a contemporary library built on the site of the ancient learning center and housed in a beautiful building designed by Norwegian architecture firm, Snøhetta.
We recently visited Cairo to attend the wedding of our good friends Brett and Vanessa. I’d heard all about the horrible pollution, the traffic and the crowds - and Cairo did not disappoint. The pollution is worse that any city in China that I have visited, the drivers are the craziest that I’ve ever encountered and we regularly sat in traffic for an hour at a time. Despite all of this, Cairo is a wonderful place. It is an energetic and dynamic city that never ceases to amaze. The mix of new and old, rich and poor, touristed and untouched, makes it a place that is hard to categorize and even harder to pin down.
I know its been a long time since I last updated Look Closer and it hasn’t been because i haven’t been taking pictures. Quite the opposite, I’ve been busy taking a lot of pictures and have not found the time to update as often as I should.
For the past month I’ve been in Beijing photographing the city during the Olympic games. It has been a really amazing experience, being in one of my favorite cities during such an exciting time. Here are a few links to some of what I’ve been working on. More to come soon….
China: Beijing’s Vanishing Hutong (PBS)
Tattoos, Once Taboo, Gain Street Credibility in China
(NYTimes)
In a Beijing Park, an Oasis for Mind and Body (NYTimes)
I just got around to developing the one roll of film I put through my Lomo on our three month trip through Central America and Mexico. I’ve forgotten where some of the shots were taken but they still bring back the dry, dusty, lonely feeling that some of the places we visited evoke.
We just got back from a relaxing week-long visit with Tara’s family in Portland, Oregon. After a few days spent celebrating Christmas and checking out Ali & Evan’s new cafe, we headed up to Evan’s family cabin in Central Oregon. We cooked food, slept in, played with the dogs and just enjoyed having a little time away from it all.
Happy New Year!