Beer Brewing in Brooklyn

What better way to spend your vacation than to witness the birth of a beer? Two days after my arrival in the US of A, Kieran and I strolled through Sunset Park to pay 'brothers' Mark and Jay a visit who were busy sullying a linoleum kitchen floor with brown, sweet liquid for a video. Kieran drew some sexually explicit comic versions of the two on the chalkboard cupboards while I was using my factory-perfect, little hands to cap a few dozen bottles at almost Chinese speed.

Despite my Germanness -- the passport and the 15 years spent munching on sausage and 'Bauernbrot' for breakfast -- I wouldn't really call myself an expert on beer or any liquors for that sake. But heck, even though not yet carbonated it was quite a delicious brew and made me want to damn my genes for making my body go berserk every time I drink.

In any case, the video of Mark and Jay brewing beer will soon be featured here: http://brothermarksbbq.com/

Summer

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Botanical Garden - Part 2

(copyright Rene Burri/Magnum Photos)

Last time I went to the Brooklyn Botanical Garden, I took a bunch of images of trees and bushes in bloom. The cherry trees were covered in a light pink, the magnolia flowers whitening bushy trees and other allergy-inducing greens. And then I lost those images due to data transfer problems. I should really know my CF cards by now. Sigh. 

So I revisited the space. The petals of the cherry blossoms were now carpeting the ground and what was left of them on the trees had turned into tiny green cherries. The magnolia flowers had been replaced with new green shoots. And I had to retreat into the winter gardens to rekindle some of  that infant-like enthusiasm that I came with the first tiem. 

I tried to re-capture some of the shots I had lost and find new shots that I had missed the first tiem. And this time I went inspired by an image of Rene Burri's (taken in Beijing in 1964. It's titled "Former Summer Palace. Dead lotus flowers on the Kunming Lake"), see above. I recently discovered this photographer while roaming around the few photography books in Barnes and Noble and have utterly fallen in love with the framing and playfulness of his photographs. 

I've been fascinated with colors and textures lately, probably because the sun has finally come out and I feel like I'm a human being again; but also because of the William Eggleston exhibition I went to a while back and the video cameras I've been playing around with lately. While I still think that characters are more powerful in images, I like the introversion and thought processes that go into photographing inanimate objects, citiscapes and other objects that are somewhere for you to find. 

Whatever it is, find below a selection of images from that day. You can find the whole set, with other (sillier) images on my flickr account. 

Green Bikes at 3rd Ward

Green Bikes Event at 3rd Ward from Lam Thuy Vo on Vimeo.

Moviehouse screenings, workshops, live music, free beer and a visit from Chuck Schumer.

Spring time

I lost about 75 images from the trip to the Botanical Garden and the annual New York pillow fight... but what can you do. 

Bushwick