Amsterdam is a special place with a very unique urban landscape and incredibly open and warm people. The canals or Grachten, how they are called there, flow through the city like veins, giving natural vitality to a otherwise very urban place.
Holland, as photographed in black and white, in April of 2017.
Winters are not precisely what they used to be in Austria, the climate change doesn’t stop at the Alps, unfortunately. As a kid I remember a lot of snow in Vienna, nowadays we don’t see barely any white in the cold season. But of course, Austria is more than just Vienna, and the conditions largely depend on altitude and location. The following pictures were shot mainly in Western Austria, Tyrol, and Vorarlberg in December.
The Sniper Tower is an abandoned high-rise building in the war-torn city of Mostar in Bosnia-Hercegovina. The eerie site is officially closed down but is still used as a graffiti art space. During the Bosnian war from 1992 to 1995, it was used by Croatian snipers to target the nearby square, also hitting and killing many civilians. Today, there is peace, luckily, but Mostar is still divided between Catholic Croats and Muslim Bosniaks, the sniper tower marking the border of the two parts of the city and standing as a visible reminder and as a warning.
The Bone Chapel in Kutna Chora, Czech Republic, can genuinely be a frighting place for some people. It is a Catholic church in a small town just one hour away from Prague with a very particular interior. The remains of 40,000 to 70,000 people decorate this chapel. Like in a Castlevania game, there is an enormous chandelier of bones, which contains at least one of every bone in the human body; there is also a coat of arms made out of human remains and many other oddities. Come down with me and look at this extraordinary place – but beware of the walking skeletons!
The inherent beauty of Japan is how it first seems to contradict itself constantly, but the more you get to know the country and its people, the more it shapes into a whole and harmonious picture. Why are the streets so clean, you may wonder, yet there is no concept of public bins. Well, people don’t produce waste on the go, and if they do, they take it with them because it ain’t the public’s business. There is a firm idea of the collective, yet there is enough place for individuality and creative expression. Most and foremost, Japanese culture is firmly rooted in the past and very forward-looking. This may seem like the biggest contradiction, but it all makes sense when traveling to this intriguing and fascinating country and getting to know its many inhabitants.
Michael Hoffman Photography 