A question of sleep

It was once asked in a foolish manner “When the dreamer dies, what happens to the dream?”
Quite simply put, the dream lives on, self-perpetuating, driven by the energy and fiery passion that spawned it into existence. It evolves, changes, adapts, learns and will continue the work of its master. It knows no boundaries and may, in fact, dream a dream of its own. It can, in special situations,  bring forth an entire Universe, infecting worlds as it writhes and swirls and shapes the very fabric of existence. Life, time, space, you, me and all that comes into being is nothing but a dream within the dream of a dreamer…dreaming.

Rivers of Molten Gold (2/365)

The Sun sometimes must feel like Midas, gilding and then liquefying everything it touches.
I guess it’s somehow safe to say the family was simply enjoying the late afternoon on the lake. Maybe it’s my nostalgia or something, I don’t know.
But Autumn is a-coming in, right? Somehow autumn makes me all giddy and shooting happy. So, hopefully, more awesome images to come in the next few months.
What would you consider to be a Golden Moment? (The theme I had to execute for today).

Where is my mind?

There is nothing more heartbreaking that a ride on the melancholy train. Rain. Cold. Night. You stare at your own reflection and can’t believe what you see. You look at others, the exact same patterns. No light in their eyes. We commute from day to day with no point, missing targets, dragging endlessly…forever dragging.

A mental illness awareness project

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Recently, one of my colleagues from Med School approached me and asked me if I wanted to help her with a charity project she was running: raising funds for a few orphans with certain disabilities. This center in our town is full of benevolent people but the funding (as with most of the things here) are very low and some of the proper medical equipment and staff but they do what they can for these poor souls.
As my friend was directing the mental illness department in the Med School’s society, I got the idea of illustrating this in a small staged photoshoot. What followed was an interesting experience, with all the models having no previous experience and improvising on the way. Enjoy!

Microcosmos

Sometimes I forget…I forget that the world we live in, all the small factual details that we take for granted are a part of something much bigger,immense,complex and undeniably impossible to encompass or comprehend with a human mind.
Only then I realize that the mind is nothing without the spirit.
Sure, you can detach yourself of all emotion,become cold,cavernous and strictly analytical  towards all causality and the free choice that we, as human beings, are so proud of. You can become so engulfed by either passion or obsession (a sign of interconversion is in order here) that feeling seems something afar and sometimes useless when all you see/need is that which you set your mind upon.
I’ve somehow ended up with a theory that declines some laws of physics and which got me into really odd conversations with very religious people or with some that simply cannot understand that sometimes looking in the mirror is the only way to look back and understand the hind side of things, the underside where the knot resides which holds the answer to the signs on the (apparently easily understood) surface.
I’ve always imagined that every one of us lives in a small sphere of time-space continuum, a bump in a fabric of the Universe’s superior side and a huge knot under, a knot where all the inter-human relations,causality,choices,possibilities,dreams,hopes and alternatives intertwine to models so vast and complex one will never understand since you walk down a single strand and follow its loops, dodging or crashing into others and their strings. And here is where choice comes into play. See it as the hand that moves the needle,intricately,smoothly,playing upon that which some call destiny,fate, God’s will or any other surrogate terms.
Sometimes, these strands intertwine with another and you end up with something so different than anything you have ever encountered before.
It is the case of certain special relationships between two human beings such as soulmates. That feeling of complete understanding,unidirectional vibration and wavelength identification between two soul cores resonating against each other’s pulse, amplifying echoes that end up caressing against the rib cage,heart and subsequently, the entire being.
This is an important factor because, unlike the above stated detachment and pure intellectual and analytical approach, this one offers comprehension and the power to dwell beyond the immediate reality and its constraining variables to dipping into essences that transcend reasoning and argumentation. This allows one to become a true artist that creates and doesn’t only reproduce, copy or restate the same sentences as others have done before him and just provide them with a new wrapping.Or at least, this is how I feel.
My art’s true goal has always been the creation of something new and innovative and expressing these ideas into various and intricate ways while exposing them in rather accessible mediums,but sometimes my vision differs so much from the ones around me that I find myself wondering whether it is I who deviates towards insanity or simply feel too much beyond or simply different from the way others perceive emotions and thoughts.
Sometimes, I wish I could just breathe it out (much like the Yogi’s Prana concept) and let the vapors condense on the surface of one’s mind and soul so that they can use these to form a lens inside, a spyglass that will bring this vision of mine closer and clearer to their comprehension.
This image tries to explain the idea that there are so many of these tiny Microcosms residing inside of me, just waiting for a “Big Bang” (a song, a picture, a feeling,a…person) so that they can start manifesting and agitating to their own plan, following the strands of another knot in another fabric of another Microcosm…

Summer’s Banner (Haiku)

 Summer wind has come
Its banner; so old and torn
Calling for freedom…

Scorching Summer

Dreaming of a sunbathed beach with white sand and a blue,blue sea…

Rock concerts and the Journey

So on Saturday, June 25th, I attended the Lake of Tears concert in Bucharest held on the Roman Arenas, along with Amine and some 3000 other people. Getting to Bucharest from my town requires a 4 hour train trip during which, most of the time, you become bored as hell. Having an exam hang above your head the following day isn’t the most tranquil thought either. It seems I have a thing with trains and shooting out from them because every time I hope on one, I keep clicking that shutter button like crazy and find numerous subjects with every new kilometer unfolding. This time, the landscape section took over as some morning , wet clouds floated close to earth and predicted a new storm coming, while the crops of various grain stretched across Romania’s biggest Plain.  
And with all that beautiful imagery, when we reached Bucharest, it was all about to rain as we started heading towards the concert location.
Now, even though I am not a teenager anymore, I still get excited every time one of my favorite bands has a concert. I jump, sing and scream and, at the end of it, I feel like every muscle in my body cries in pain, my throat is useless while notes from every song, the crowd singing and clapping and the general atmosphere of joy and overflowing energy will remain in my memory as one of the most amazing experiences ever (which is normal, for an audiophile like me).

The one thing I regret, though is that they didn’t allow us to bring cameras to the concert and I was limited to cell phone shots which can’t be held accountable as true photographic evidence due to poor quality, but they’re perfect for that personal album in which you store all these memories and sometimes you open to refresh the feeling.

“Torii” and the Sacrum-Profane Equilibrium

A torii is a traditional Japanese gate most commonly found at the entrance of or within a Shinto shrine, where it symbolically marks the transition from the profane to the sacred (according to Wikipedia).
After a long night partying at a friend’s house, somewhere in a remote Romanian village, faraway from the agitation and frenetic pulse of the city, after singing by the fire and watching the stars while lying on my back in the fresh grass full of dew, after everybody else had fallen asleep, I stood there awake, wrapped in a blanket and looking into the remains of the fire as they wood slowly gave away its last shine and the coal tried to shine on but the creeping sunrise was slowly extinguishing.
And then, one of my friends asked (half dozed by booze, I’ll admit) : “What state of matter does fire represent?”
The correct chemistry answer was: “A mixture of hot gases, vapors and, if the heat is enough, ionized gases a.k.a plasma”
He replied,in a somewhat unconvinced way: “Is that what fire means to you?”

Obviously, the scientific answer was not the one he was looking for. And then it struck me.
It was about everything else. The outing, the fire, fun and good company, the Sun rising beyond the eastern hills… to us, it was a return to innocence, something sacred in a bond to our ancestral origins and traditions, to the greater meaning in the wind’s whispers and the magic in the Nightingale’s songs.
I emerged from my protective cover, picked up my camera and, barefoot and half asleep, like through an autumn reverie, I started climbing towards the highest eastern hill for the upcoming sunrise. Grass felt so soft, air started to warm up and the sky filled with pastel colors that glimmered through the thin clouds.
The road lead under these gigantic power poles that carried the energy from a Hydroelectric power plant some 100 kilometers away. The buzzing of the lines, as the  10,000 volts passed through theme brought an even more ethereal feeling as if an energetic barrier had been set between the green waves and the human civilization residing beyond it.

So, I passed and started shooting as the Sun was slowly climbing the horizon. I can’t tell for how I have been there but when I turned towards the poles I saw four of my friends taking a walk (probably in a desire to catch the sunrise).

They stopped under the massive structure as I did, staring in wonder and that is when the photograph happened.

I chose this title as a reminder of what should be kept truly sacred in our hearts: the purity, the simplicity and innocence of all things in the world. No religious fanaticism, no rituals, no obligations.