Italy Within The Frame – Day 9 – Burano

Burano is a small island on the outer reaches of the Venetian Archipelago that few people bother to visit. The nearer and more famous island of Murano with its tradition of glass blowing and the manufacture of its distinctive colored glass objects d’arts, seems to be more of a magnet for the tides of tourists and cruise ships tours that increasingly seem to flood a Venice already under assault from natures forces.

The 45 minute boat ride provides a transition from the hectic crowded streets and canals of Venice, to a small fishing island with brightly painted houses and walls. The wider streets and the riot of colors suggest a world apart from the more sober colors and grandeur of Venice, but on closer inspection you see the links – a couple of small canals here, a boatyard manufacturing gondolas there and shops selling beautiful lace. The island was probably settled by the Romans but only rose in importance in the 16th century, when women on the island began making lace with needles, a tradition introduced via Venetian-ruled Cyprus, but more specifically the small town of Lefkara where Leonardo da Vinci visited in 1481 and purchased a cloth for the main alter of the Duomo di Milano.

The lace was soon exported across Europe, but decline began in the 18th century and the industry did not revive until 1872, when a school of lacemaking was opened and lacemaking on the island boomed again. Few now make lace in the traditional manner as it is extremely time-consuming and therefore expensive, and the few tourist shops around the ferry station that sells the lace, hint at a glorious past and a more commercial future.

Burano is also known for its small, brightly-painted houses, popular with artists and designers – Philippe Starck owns three houses on the island. Some suggest that the colors originated so that the fishermen could see the town even when out at sea, but whatever the stimulus, the colours of the houses follow a specific system originating from the golden age of its development. If someone wishes to paint their home, one must send a request to the government, who will respond by making notice of the colours permitted for that lot. This practice has resulted in the myriad of warm, pastelly colours that characterises the island today, and creates a harlequin effect of contrasting windows ,doors, walls and alleys

On this, our last full day of Italy Within The Frame, we wandered the streets of this charming town, capturing the shapes, forms and contrast that this kaleidoscope of colors provided us. I was still trying to explore the idea of motion, and shot of couple of images I love – one of which is shown here on the left – as well as lot of windows, doors and shadows. I also spent time with Eli Reinholdtsen and Jeff Fielding chatting to some wonderful retired gondoliers who were sitting in their rowing club passing the time of day and regaled us with tales of their prowess.

On our return to Venice, David duChemin and I hired a gondola for an hour and a half, and went exploring the canals of the old historic quarter between the Rialto bridge and Piazza San Marco. Armed with tripods, flashes and some wide angles lens, we experimented in trying to get some atmospheric and moody shots of the gondolier and the canals.

Gondolas are not the most stable of objects as they rock side to side and at times even the tripod was in danger of tipping over. However by anchoring the camera on the tripod we were able to retain the gondola itself as perfectly sharp, allowing us to blur the motion of the gondolier as he pushed his way through the canals, or used his leg to kick of the walls.

As we went under bridges we experimented with firing a hand held off-camera flash with an orange gel fitted to provide some warm fill light. Some of David’s images are truly breathtaking – mine a little less accomplished, although a couple of my shots on the Grand Canal using a panning technique as the gondola turned which produced an ethereal image. Some of the shots taken pointing towards the front of the gondola are fun as the walls blur, whilst the gondolas remains tack sharp.

I don’t think they will win me any prizes, but it was huge fun, entirely experimental and if you don’t try something like this you just don’t know. I’ll post some more of these once I have completed the processing of them.

It was an appropriate way to end not just our time in Venice but our time on the Italy Within The Frame workshop. It has been an extraordinary journey both literally and figuratively. spent with a wonderful, entertaining and generous bunch of friends. We have cried with laughter, we have made fools of ourselves in large public piazzas running in circles while we panned or dragged the shutter with second curtain synch. We have become leading authorities on Negronis and Foccaccia al Formaggio; we have shared kit, experiences, stories, laughter and tears.

But above all we have all learned a huge amount. David duChemin and Jeffrey Chapman’s relaxed mentoring approach has helped each of us address and overcome our photographic barriers or frustrations. Through them we have become objective about our work, we have learned to understand what should be within the frame and what should be left out and we have enhanced our awareness of composition, form, contrast, color, mood or post processing.

I am looking forward to being at home, seeing the family, and reflecting on what I have learned, but I shall really miss the company of a group that have now become firm friends.

If David and Jeffrey decide to run this tour or a similar tour in Italy again, make sure you are following them on twitter, as I can guarantee the tour will sell out in minutes. You can follow them by clicking on these links:

David DuChemin

Jeffrey Chapman

and while we are about it, you can follow me to on twitter, by clicking here: Marco Ryan

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 4th, 2010 at 2:35 pm. It is filed under Travel, Workshops and tagged with Burano, David duChemin, Italy within the Frame, ITWF, Jeffrey Chapman, Venice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.