Red Cathedral

Have you ever been to a carnaval parade?  There are several genres. You've got the stylish & elegant Venetian style parades and there are those where the people take back the right to satire everything they see in the world around them. The best known & biggest ( 105k spectators on Sunday ) carnaval parade in my country is the carnaval in Aalst which happened at the same moment as the one in Tongeren.  But I took my electric step and vroomed to the eldest city in Belgium: Atuatuca Tungrorum ( founded 7 BC ) and I enjoyed myself. . Just like many other regions, Limburg has a rich carnaval history and you could really see the people yearn for this parade. The 2019 canaraval got cancelled last minute due to a storm. 2020-21 Had a pandemic. Apparently there was a tiny last-minute carnaval parade in 2022.. yet I seem to have missed it.. and not just me. Hence the recently invented Dutch word knaldrang was almost tangible in the air: people wanted to celebrate,...

Yes, I know: I had promised to cover only one carnaval's parade per year. But I have a great excuse: a brandnew camera fell into my lap to experiment with and I needed an event for testing. So no, it was neither the free booze, nor the happy people, nor the smoutebollen that lured me to Hasselt.. those are simply perks of working . Just to be clear: that Sony A9III is a magnificent camera with crazy specs. I will probably consider buying the 2nd or 3rd generation of its Global Shutter sensor technology, but for now it's great, but not needed for what I shoot. Sports + wildlife shooters and everyone who runs into banding effects are the intended targets and they'll enjoy it greatly.  Hasselt carnaval has a very enjoyable parade wth several international participants & loads of confetti. The 2024 parcours had some very long, straight streets.. perfect to test a huge 300mm f2.8-lens. Thes most excillerating was however something tiny & strictly personal: I r...

Tongeren looks at its best when the entire city is celebrating . Carnaval is on the shortlist of highlight events. So eventhough I was still completely exhausted from the wonderful masked ball Ensor Danst in Alden Biesen the night before, had only slept 4 hours and my aching back was killing me, I hopped.. well rather: crawled .. on my electric step so I would not miss the big carnaval parade in the city center. An image gallery : This year I stayed on the sidelines instead of jumping into the parade and shoot portraits like last year . So that's different. What's also different were the antique Carnaval Giants leading the parade. They had been lost for decades and after being recovered the team from Mario's delicious ice-cream parlor restored them. Kudos to that restauration team! If I'm feeling better & more alive next year, I'll be once again in the middle of the action.. the way I like it. ▷ All photos can be found on/downloaded from my Flickr...

My first event coverage after a long recovery from surgery. C19 had made most of the local carnaval parades impossible these last years and earlier this month a car crashed into a carnaval group killing 6 and hurting dozens more. But you can't destroy  the true carnaval spirit that lives in the smaller cities & rural villages of Europe. In the past decennia I've covered carnaval parades in the Le Nord of France, in Malta, in Italy and last weekend: at 12km from my home, in a tiny town in the middle of fields and meadows called Veldwezelt . And they know how to celebrate.. The pictures are HERE, on flickr A one minute video is HERE, on Clapper Some samples?  ;   . . More pictures are on Flickr

Ja, het is weer die periode van het jaar dat Limburgers, Brabanders en vele andere feestzielen wekelijks ergens carnaval kunnen gaan vieren. Tongeren, Aalst en vast nog heel andere plaatsen openden dit jaar gezamenlijk het eerste carnavalsweekend. Aangezien ik de afgelopen weken weer 7 op 7 aan het werk was en ook de dag ervoor nog een Experience Day had, maakte ik van de gelegenheid gebruik om te genieten van enkele drankjes en van de heerlijke voorlentezon ipv enkel door de zoekers van de camera's te staren.  Bovendien was het ditmaal zo ongezien druk in de straten door de duizenden bezoekers dat een drankje meer dan nodig was om de introversie te overwinnen en me door de massa te wringen. Noem je bedankt worden in booze in ruil voor een foto: " corruptie "? In dat geval ben ik iedere carnaval erg corrupt.. and just let me enjoy it ! Vooraleer door te scrollen naar de fotogalerij, eerst enkele nuttige links: ▷ Alle foto's zijn te vinden & te downloaden ...

Every February Bruges may officially name itself The Venice of the North for another reason than the Reien (= city canals ) & the bowbridges who vaguely resemble the sinking Italian city-state. For one day the masked elegance of the carnaval parade takes over the streets. Not a carnaval like it is usually celebrated in the Lowlands, but a Venetian style citywalk. Is it pretty to behold? Absolutely. On top of that, this year the weather changed into a bright sunny weekend after 14 months of gloom & rain. Even better! Still this might have been my last visit to the event because it has become simply too crowded with dozens of photographers, entire photoclubs & a tenfold thereof in pushy cellphonographers. So I shot only a few stills, am - as usual - only satisfied by a handful - but that's typically me - and had that crazy Geert not stopped me, I would have walked away after only 1/3rd of those shots. So yes, the introvert part of my abivert personality is getting...

Since I was still processing the images from the O-Parade , I really did not go to Ciao Tongeren to make photos. I did however take the tiny Sony FX3 cinema camera because I had to test a reported audio-issue.. if I had the time, because my focus would lie 100% on enjoying nice wine and tasty food. Normally all music during this event is: old Italian chanson. But what did I suddenly hear while having a limoncello at Ambishop? Music to my taste? Rock à la Willy Radio ? The concrete minds ! A bunch of promising young hounds with the rock 'n roll attitude of old wolves playing gritty hits at The Pub.. I always say: support you local artists . So I had to make a few shots. Luckily this FX3 cinema camera also shoots stills. And luckily The Pub served some rather decent wine to make me even happier. A short video of the band performing: on Clapper To the people who posed for the camera at Buonissimo & Olio Vino: the images are in the gallery.. and the fruity rosé was delicious! ...

Every 7 years over 10% of the population in the oldest city in Belgium participates in a week of reenactments, processions & after dark shows, all dedicated to the biblical Mary. ( Background story ) and they're aged between 89 years and 1 month old. In 2023, for the 19th edition since 1890 , there are over 3000 participants and they attracted 65000 spectators on the 1st day. 3 More days to go, I said after that 1st Sunday You can just feel a symbiotic connection, some strange form of unity between the citizens. Yes, it's a religious evocation of biblical stories and many participate out of pure heartfelt beliefs, but it's also more than that. It trancends simple religious zealousness both as a spectacle and as a way to create bridges & forge bonds between the citizens. The final day still lured over 50000 visitors to the town ( a day during which it was live-streamed ànd most events for that day were cancelled due to a code red storm warning ) Very impressive...