Today we’ve had a brilliant summer day down here, with temperatures above 25C and the beaches packed with people. Nice has been literally invaded by tourists – I believe the combination of Italian, British and even Polish long weekends has taken its toll. Meantime, I’ve noticed that I have finally gotten to the end of photos dated 2013 on my waiting list for posting.  It has been a good year, photographically speaking.

I was watching a weekly political talk show yesterday evening: “Virus”, on the Italian RAI 2, and as usual the program ended with an interview. This time, the guest was Giovanni Gastel, presented as the greatest Italian fashion photographer. I’m not really much into fashion, and am not too fond of colour photography either, but Gastel certainly is a lively creative figure. He said something quite obvious, but worth remembering: when you are making a photograph, you must raise above banality, discarding the first three or four “instinctive” ideas on how to shoot whatever you are setting to do. The instinctive ideas hold us slaves to collective cliche’s, and to how we THINK things should look like. To show something interesting, you need to work more, experiment, elaborate. He says, he usually begins with a “working” shot, and then tries to develop the idea to the point he likes it enough. That’s a strong endorsement of today’s immediacy made available cheaply by digital.

“Bye Bye Blackbird” – Chet Baker