story and photos by Charles Beckwith
model is Kristina Günther of Beatrice in Milan
I was in Italy for the main womenswear fashion week in Milan, Milan Moda Donna, in late September. Looking at the schedule about half way through the week, I realized the last two days would be fairly slow. I decided to ditch fashion week and do a day trip, so I could see some more of the country. It was a toss up between taking the train to Venice or Verona, and I decided on Venice “to see it before it sinks.” What does a fashion photographer take with him when sightseeing in interesting places? A statuesque brunette, of course!
note: there is a photo gallery on the last page of this story, which will show you the photos in higher resolution
Beatrice International Models Agency was a few blocks from my hotel in Milan, so I walked over and looked at who was in town and available. I picked out Kristina Günther, a tall dark haired model from Germany, and her agent set everything up for her to meet me the next morning.
We took an early train from Milan to Venice.
All of these pictures were shot with available light, and Kristina is wearing her own clothes. We didn’t pull anything from the showrooms for this trip.
When we got off the train there was a ferry dock right in front of the station, and we took a ferry ride down the Grand Canal toward the Piazza San Marco.
The sunlight blasting through the overcast sky was very bright out on the water.
After a 20 minute ride, we arrived at the dock near the Piazza San Marco. We didn’t head there immediately, but instead went wandering through the narrow streets around the basilica. There are no roads for cars in Venice, so all the goods are transported on carts through the maze of passages. I loved the way shafts of light were cutting down into this alleyway.
The most striking thing to me in Venice was the range of rich colors that were everywhere. The water in the shadows of the canals was a very saturated green color, and then there were all the buildings made of so many colors of stone and painted plaster, and there were little accents of color in fabric or flowers or painted ornaments everywhere. It was really just spectacular everywhere I looked.
The level of detail in the architecture was amazing. With all these combinations of color and detail, and the sense of history in the place, I felt like I couldn’t take a single picture in the whole city without getting something interesting in the frame.
We walked around for a long time and then stumbled into an interesting little courtyard where we had lunch. I took pictures of Kristina’s wine glass and cigarettes before the food came.
She has an interesting lighter a friend brought to her from Argentina, and despite my aversion to the whole smoking thing, I thought the “Vogue” brand cigarette box was funny.
The lasagna I ordered was unbelievably good, and after we ate, I took this picture of Kristina in front of an interesting wall that I had been staring at for half an hour from the table.
Partly, the reason I wanted to go to Venice was to do research for a film I want to make, and a scene in the film involves a princess looking for her lover from a gondola in Venice. These are really just test shots for a much larger project I have in my head. The light in the smaller canals was wonderful. I took about 2,800 pictures on this one day trip, and at least half of them were shot in the gondola.
Our gondolier’s name was Pietro. This was my favorite shot the entire day. When the gondoliers are about to turn a blind corner in the canals they call out a warning ahead. Unfortunately, I can’t remember the word he was shouting. Normally I would have written it down, but I was too busy taking pictures.
We were in the narrow rivers going under low bridges at first, and then we came out onto the Grand Canal.
Eventually we went back into the smaller canals, which I liked better because of the less direct diffused sunlight.
Pietro almost lost his hat going under this one!
After the gondola ride we were pretty exhausted (I took over a thousand pictures and Kristina posed for all of them), so we chilled out a bit and did some sight-seeing. We finally made it to Basilica San Marco (Saint Mark’s Basilica, the main cathedral in Venice).
In the Piazza San Marco is a statue of a Griffin held high on a pedestal near the edge of the sea.
There are islands across the water from the Basilica San Marco. This one is Isola di San Georgio Maggiore, and the big building with the dome in the middle is the Basilica di San Georgio Maggiore.
We walked along the waterfront, and there are several bridges where the canals come out. I love the mix of colors and textures in this shot. Be sure to look at this one in higher resolution with the gallery at the end of the article.
We finally felt recuperated from the gondola ride and got back to taking model shots.
This was our last look just as the sun was going down.
the higher resolution images can be viewed on the NEXT PAGE