Thursday, February 21, 2013

Harlem Reacts to "Harlem Shake" Videos

Street interviews with members of the Harlem community, and their views about the popular 'Harlem Skake' video trend.

Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Ansel Adams, Photographer (1958) narrated by Beaumont Newhall

The Science of Pornography Addiction (SFW)

Isn't it time to respect Venezuela's democracy?


By Samuel Moncada, Special to CNN
February 18, 2013 -- Updated 1218 GMT (2018 HKT)



Over the past decade, all sorts of predictions have been made, ranging from catastrophic election defeats to the implosion of the Venezuelan economy. But the fact these predictions have failed to materialize has not deterred many of Venezuela's most fervent critics in their quest to engineer a constant and misleading narrative of impending disaster.

The reality is that ever since President Hugo Chavez was first elected, Venezuela has defied these negative predictions and brought unprecedented social progress to the country over the last 14 years. Since 2004 poverty has been reduced by half andextreme poverty has been cut by 70%. University enrolment has doubled, entitlement to public pensions has tripled, and access to health care and all levels of education have been dramatically expanded.

Venezuela now has the lowest levels of economic inequality of any Latin American country as measured by the Gini coefficient. Our country has already achieved many of the Millennium Development Goals, and is well on target to achieve all eight by the 2015 deadline.

This progress has been achieved by using Venezuela's vast oil revenues to transform the lives of ordinary people. The sheer scale of our oil reserves -- the world's largest -- guarantees the complete sustainability of the model in which the country's resources are used to stimulate growth in the economy and aid development.

But Chavez's most significant achievement has been to trigger the awakening and empowerment of the majority. A majority of Venezuelans have seen vast improvements in their living standards and, as a consequence, they have continued to defend their interests at the ballot box.

The Venezuelan people are very clear about what they want.President Chavez was re-elected in October 2012 with 54% of the vote in an election that boasted an 81% turnout. The Venezuelan people showed their support for the government again in December 2012 in the gubernatorial elections, which saw Chavez's political party win 20 out of 23 states.
Governments in Europe and other parts of the world could only dream of these levels of support after 14 years in power. This shows that social progress in Venezuela has been consolidated and that there is a desire to further expand this progress.

In the coming years, the Venezuelan government will continue to respond to the needs of the Venezuelan people. Hundreds of thousands of new homes have been built over the last two years which have not only greatly improved living standards but also provided jobs and contributed to a boom in the construction industry. The government is well on its way to meeting its target of building three million new homes by 2019.

While many economies around the world are shrinking, theVenezuelan economy grew by 5.5% in 2012. Against the backdrop of a continuing international financial crisis, commerce in Venezuela grew by 9.2% and communications by 7.2%, manufacturing grew by 2.1% and the oil sector grew by 1.4% -- making Venezuela one of the fastest growing economies in Latin America.

At a time when many countries are attacking the rights of the most vulnerable sectors of society, Venezuela is providing ever greater protection for low-income senior citizens and single-parent families with younger children or disabled dependents.

The failed development models of previous governments condemned millions of Venezuelans to poverty. Before the election of Chavez in 1998, Venezuela suffered years of falling GDP. The country had one of the worst economic records in the world -- a record that led to mass social unrest and violent military crackdowns.
Venezuela will continue on its path of social progress and empowering ordinary citizens. The greatest hope for the future is the people know that they alone hold the power to determine the direction the country will take.
After so many failed predictions, isn't it time to respect Venezuela's democracy and the will of the people?




Tuesday, February 19, 2013

A Democratic Display in the Center of the World


Rafael Correa, An Anti-Obama in Ecuador?

by ADAM CHIMIENTI AND CARMEN L. ARIAS
Latin American elections always seem to get it these days. Western journalists cannot deny an opportunity to pass without throwing some stones. So it was hardly surprising when the words “dictator”(Reuters, BBC) and “handouts”(USA Today, CBS News) were thrown into the hastily assembled reports on the election in “tiny”, read: insignificant,[i] Ecuador and the results turned out to be heavily in favor of the “anti-American” candidate.
It’s interesting to look at each of these terms to see the duplicitous nature of Western reporting. For example, the word dictator should hardly apply to Rafael Correa, the Ecuadorian President comfortably reelected. That is unless you enjoy the use of hyperbole for dramatic effect. As they say, if it bleeds… and Latin American blood is always especially crimson in the grey of the New York Times and its counterparts. Except President Correa in Ecuador has killed no one. He has started zero wars, tortured or killed zero citizens, and while he may have a “pugnacious” (Reuters again) attitude how else could one realistically expect a politician to survive in the 21st century.
Here’s what you need to know. Rafael Correa was a nobody on the political scene in Ecuador when George W. Bush was being inaugurated for the second time in Washington 8 years ago. I know. It’s not polite to bring up such ugly episodes in US history but allow me to refresh your memory for a second. Bush just beat the current Secretary of State John Kerry in the November election and presumed he had a mandate. He was talking about going after Social Security. The left, right and center were paying close attention. It turns out though, that Bush’s victory was an incredibly narrow one, with allegations of strange occurrences in Ohio, people being forced to wait in line for hours around the country and corporations spending ever more on getting their representatives elected.[ii] All in all, the result was a US democracy looking less and less like an established fact, and more and more like some kind of disturbing case of regression back into the “good old days” of black, brown, poor, and those with some form of exploitable vulnerability being prevented from voting because they were black, brown, poor or vulnerable. No matter though. Both Kerry and Bush were rather familiar politicians, both extremely wealthy, both went to Yale and both even played in the same dark dungeons there.[iii] How nice!
Meanwhile, Rafael Correa was a nobody on the Ecuadorian political scene back then. Journalists would have found no reason to write about him, negatively or otherwise. Then, the Ecuadorian people had grown tired of dirty politics and politicians once and for all it seemed. Various social groups came together including natives from the highlands and lowlands and leftists who were inspired by Chavez in Venezuela, Lula in Brazil, Kirchner in Argentina, and Morales in Bolivia. They decided to throw out a president they called Sucio (Dirty) Lucio. Lucio Gutierrez was an alright guy in their eyes back in the year 2000 when he was in military fatigues and had decided to lend his hand to the social movements that were stirred up by a terrible economic crisis that featured dollarization of the economy. If you live in the US and wondered what happened to all your dirty old dollar bills, then dollarization could help you understand.
In 1999, the country was told by economists from the US and those benevolent monetary institutions, the IMF and World Bank, that its sucre currency was especially filthy lucre and needed to be thrown out. In turn, they could start using the US dollar and be happier for it. One problem though was that anyone with any small amount of savings in the bank were practically wiped out. So along came Sucio Lucio with some supporters behind him, ready to say ¡Ya Basta! but it turned out that he was only playing nice. Actually, Sucio Lucio was destined for bigger and better things than low or highland “Indians”. He had a date with George W. from Yale. How exciting!
Eventually, the people of Ecuador were stirred up once again and decided to take to the streets one more time. The legislature would have to take decisive action. The rest, as they say, is history. Lucio Gutierrez would be removed from office, albeit in a very civilized way, and his vice President Alfredo Palacio would take over. The man who would temporarily be in charge of the government in Quito was a medical doctor by trade. He would reportedly told BBC Journalist Greg Palast, our former boss, that if the IMF really made the Andean country pay the debt they said Ecuador owed, then they would not survive. This story isn’t about him though. It’s about the colorful and confident, if not pugnacious, finance minister he chose for a brief stint in 2005. This man subscribed to the views of Ha Joon Chang and other heterodox economists who pointed out that the West was “kicking away the ladder” when it came to advice on how to run an economy. His name was Rafael Correa!
Correa would then go on to run for president himself and surprise everyone by whipping the ever-persistent banana magnate and #1 wealthiest man in the country. Alvaro Noboa is the man behind Bonita bananas and he believed Ecuador should proudly continue in the path of the banana republicanism that it was known for. He felt so strongly about this that he was to run for president five times and not be deterred by his lack of success.[iv] Correa disagreed and so did the Ecuadorian people. The West was, wait for it now, flabbergasted. How could this be? Oh, that’s right! It was because Latin Americans like to elect populists who in turn like to screw up economies, and then who like to head for Miami or Zurich or some other safe haven. So the story goes.
Correa was not your typical populist in the sense that he actually knew a bit about what he was doing. He had studied in the US but he didn’t leave with tears in eyes, saying he’ll never forget those wonderful Yankees. He came back home like many Ecuadorians would love to do, and he did so with a plan. [Note: the country’s economy has been tragically dependent on remissions, with Ecuadorian migrants propping up the likes of Western Union and filling the squares of Madrid, Rome and other European cities on Sunday to celebrate their only day off.]
Correa’s plan was to save the economy of Ecuador by putting into place the economic programs so rarely enacted but superior in every way to the IMF Structural Adjustment Plans (SAPs) that economists love to talk about. There would be no more borrowing to pay off loans. There would be no more privatizing to place premiums on necessities such as water, electricity, gas and oil. Correa would reverse course and, six years later, Ecuador is celebrating their democracy with pride. While I do not wish to be overzealous and depict a knight in shining armour, most of the people are very happy with their president. They respect him and they even care about politics with him at the helm. This includes young and the old, the poor and the middle class, the black, brown and white.
I know. You’re thinking I’ve heard all this before. Obama was standing in DC reciting his passionate inaugural speech only weeks ago. Tears, though not as many as in 2008, were flowing and Obama supporters were saying it was time to get busy. Electoral politics is a sham but let’s give the Ecuadorian people and the government some credit here. The election appeared well-organized and peaceful. The winner was an incumbent with a plan to continue to try to revitalize the economy by giving ordinary everyday people a chance at living a life devoid of the desperation that comes with deep impoverishment. They are investing in social programs like healthcare, education, grassroots cooperatives, and even trying to mitigate serious environmental problems. In an article in The Guardian, the Indian economist Jayati Ghosh has called Ecuador the most radical and exciting place on earth as a result.[v]
Since Correa first took office in early 2007, he got a lot of interesting things done. He defaulted on Ecuador’s debt (that his predecessor swore would be the death of the country).[vi] He kept his campaign promise to evict the United States military from their base at Manta. He set about correcting some serious problems with the constitution by leading a team to draft a new one. This new constitution would be the first to provide rights to the environment, that is, rivers, lakes, and forests in Ecuador have rights and can be legally defended. He also sponsored a plan to keep the oil in the soil with the Yasuni Initiative, a plan to attract investors whose funds would be used to not extract oil.[vii] The plan and the constitution were hailed as trailblazing. Imagine all that from a dimunitive nation like Ecuador. He also declared solidarity with the plaintiffs in the Amazon against a shameless US corporation[viii] (Shell, now Chevron), whose refusal to act with minimal responsibility when drilling for oil and to clean up after itself has led to serious problems with the land and its inhabitants.[ix] He even invited Julian Assange to come down and live, so he could be sheltered from those countries (Sweden, Australia, the US) willing to destroy liberties to avoid the frightening idea of the free flow of information.
This is not to say that all is rosy. There are plenty of problems that must be dealt with. As in Venezuela and the United States, crime is a serious problem. People are worried about the executive branch having too much power. Mining in the country is deemed necessary by the government but the people that live in areas that will be affected need to have a seat at the table. Furthermore, Correa’s style can offend. His former ally, Alberto Acosta, broke with him because he feared that the president’s ego and quest for power was becoming too much. The progressive constitution the country’s assembly had written was being manipulated by the president in a quest to maintain and increase his power. He was backing down on some of the promises he made about the environment and was increasingly intolerant of dissent. Acosta was challenging him from the left and we can hope that the pressure he applies will keep the president in check and even set agendas like third parties should be able to do. Acosta, who called Correa “the sun-king of the 21st century” claiming that he controls everything,[x] appeared not to have a significant following in the election with only 3.4% of the vote, less than the banana magnate Noboa and Sucio Lucio Gutierrez (yes, both really did run again). His main competition, Lasso with around 22.5% of the vote, was a banker and it was really no contest at all.
It does seem that Correa has broken a lot less promises than President Obama. It also appears that he is probably not going to lock up whistleblowers, kill his own citizens, make a mockery of the citizens’ increasingly undermined civil liberties invade countries for “humanitarian purposes” like Bush and Obama have done. Rather, it seems like he is willing to stand up and count when it matters, like when an oil company poisons a significant portion of the country (BP flavored shrimp anyone?) or when bankers try to get their way by ruthlessly insisting that austerity simply must be carried out. There is an alternative and there shall always be one. Promises should be kept sometimes at least. ¡Viva la revolucion ciudadana in Ecuador and everywhere!
Adam Chimienti is a teacher and a doctoral student originally from New York. He can be reached at ajchimienti@gmail.com. Carmen L. Arias can be reached at karmenarias@gmail.com
Notes
[i] The Washington Post and Daily Mail, amongst others, recently used the adjective tiny, to describe Ecuador, roughly the size of Nevada.
[ii] For a summary of these problems that for the most part have yet to remedied see http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/24/national/24vote.html
[iii] Remember Skull and Bones: see this 60 Minutes “Skull and Bones,” http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-576332.html
[iv] Alvaro Noboa likes to fashion himself as a philantropist http://www.alvaronoboa.org/2011/03/alvaro-noboa-helping-hand.html but critics contend that he uses the social funds for political purposes when running for office according to his Wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81lvaro_Noboa#cite_note-9. Human Rights Watch has cited him for widespread abuse of labor and for child labor. See http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2002/04/24/ecuador-widespread-labor-abuse-banana-plantations
[v] Jayati Ghosh. “Could Ecuador be the most radical and exciting place on earth?” The Guardian 19 January 2012 online at http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/jan/19/ecuador-radical-exciting-place, accessed 18 June 2012.
[vi] For more on the default and the reasoning behind it see Neil Watkins and Sarah Anders. “Ecuador’s Debt Default,” Foreign Policy in Focus December 15, 2008 at http://www.ipsdc.org/articles/ecuadors_debt_default_exposing_a_gap_in_the_global_financial_architecture accessed online on 18 May 2012 and an article titled “Ecuador declares foreign debt illegitimate,” published as an entry in the series Project Censored. Accessed online at http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/10-ecuador-declares-foreign-debt-illegitimate/
[vii] John Vidal. “Can Oil Save the Rainforest?” 19 January 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jan/20/can-oil-save-the-rainforest, accessed 19 January 2013.
[viii] According to a transcript from an interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! on 29 June 2009, http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/29/ecuadoran_president_rafael_correa_on_global, accessed on 21 September 2012.
[ix] William Langeweische. “Jungle Law,” Vanity Fair May 2007, http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/05/texaco200705, accessed 1 October 2012.
[x] See BBC News Election coverage http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-21379601

Monday, February 18, 2013

Correa: cuatro lecciones de su victoria



Ecuador: cuatro lecciones de una victoria aplastante




 (Por Atilio A. Boron) La arrasadora victoria de Rafael Correa, con un porcentaje de votos y una diferencia entre él y su más inmediato contendiente que ya hubieran querido tener Obama, Hollande, Rajoy, entre  otros, deja algunas lecciones que es conveniente recapitular.  

    Primero y lo más obvio: la ratificación del mandato popular para seguir por el camino trazado pero, como dijo Correa en su conferencia de prensa,  avanzando más rápida y profundamente. Sabe el re-electo presidente que los próximos cuatro años serán cruciales para asegurar la irreversibilidad de las reformas que, al cabo de diez años de gestión, habrán concluido con la refundación de un Ecuador mejor, más justo y más sustentable. Un Ecuador en donde la diversidad no sea fuente de desigualdad.  En la conferencia de prensa ya aludida dijo textualmente: “o cambiamos ahora al país o no lo cambiamos más”. El proyecto de crear un orden social basado en el socialismo delsumak kawsay, el “buen vivir” de nuestros pueblos originarios, exige actuar con rapidez y determinación. Pero esto también lo saben la derecha vernácula y el imperialismo, y por eso se puede pronosticar que van a redoblar sus esfuerzos para evitar la consolidación del proceso de la “Revolución Ciudadana.”

    Segunda lección: que si un gobierno obedece al mandato popular y produce políticas públicas que benefician a las grandes mayorías nacionales –que al fin y al cabo de eso trata la democracia- la lealtad del electorado puede darse por segura. La manipulación de las oligarquías mediáticas, la conspiración de las clases dominantes y las estratagemas del imperialismo se estrellan contra el muro de la fidelidad popular ante un gobierno fiel a sus mandatos.

     Tercero, y como corolario de lo anterior, el aplastante triunfo de Correa demuestra que la conformista tesis tan común en el pensamiento político convencional, a saber: que “el poder desgasta”, sólo es válida en democracia cuando el poder se ejerce en beneficio de las minorías adineradas o cuando los procesos de transformación social pierden espesor, titubean y terminan por detenerse. Al paralizarse, al abandonar el impulso transformador, se encaminan hacia su propia destrucción. Su condición de viabilidad es la permanente profundización y aceleración del proceso reformista. Pero cuando se gobierna teniendo a la vista el bienestar de las víctimas del sistema pasa lo que ocurrió ayer en Ecuador: si en la presidencial del 2009 Correa ganó en la primera vuelta con el 51 por ciento de los votos, ayer lo hizo, con el recuento existente al momento de escribir esta nota (un 25 por ciento de los votos escrutados) con el 57 por ciento. En lugar de “desgaste”, consolidación y acrecentamiento del poder residencial.
     
Cuarto y último, con esta elección se supera la parálisis decisional generada por una Asamblea Nacional que se opuso con intransigencia a algunas de las más importantes iniciativas propuestas por Correa. Si bien hay pocas cifras disponibles al respecto no caben dudas de que Alianza PAIS tendrá la mayoría absoluta de los asambleistas y con posibilidades de alcanzar una representación parlamentaria que le permita contar con una mayoría calificada de dos tercios. Una Asamblea Nacional que acompañe el proceso de cambios tendría que abocarse de inmediato a elaborar y sancionar la Ley Orgánica de Comunicación, un nuevo Código Ambiental, la Ley de Aguas (esencial para la reforma agraria) entre otras piezas legislativas de fundamental importancia. La reconfiguración del mapa sociopolítico de la Asamblea Nacional permitirá remover los obstáculos que, hasta ahora, impidieron el avance en algunos frentes estratégicos del proceso de construcción de una nueva sociedad.

      Con el triunfo de Correa, la reciente victoria de Hugo Chávez en Venezuela y la previsible ratificación del mandato popular a favor de Evo Morales en Bolivia el núcleo duro del “giro a la izquierda” experimentado por América Latina a comienzos de siglo queda notablemente fortalecido, ejerciendo un influjo favorable sobre los procesos en curso en países como Argentina, Brasil y Uruguay. Conclusión: los tiempos han cambiado. La ratificación plebiscitaria de un presidente que lideró  un formidable proceso de cambios sociales y económicos; que apuesta sin reservas -y trabaja para- la integración latinoamericana; que desafió al imperio incorporando su país al ALBA y que puso fin a la presencia estadounidense en la base de Manta; que realizó una ejemplar auditoría de la deuda externa reduciendo significativamente su monto; que le otorga asilo a Julian Assange y que retira al Ecuador del CIADI no es algo que se vea todos los días. Hay una gran razón para celebrar. ¡Felicitaciones Rafael Correa, salud Ecuador!          
fuente: http://www.atilioboron.com.ar/

Lichtenstein. A Retrospective. Tate Modern, London

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

el criticon recortado: VECINO, de Argenis Mills

el criticon recortado: VECINO, de Argenis Mills: Argenis Mills · 2011 · Color · 11’05''


Argenis Mills · 2011 · Color · 11’05''


En un único espacio y con un único personaje presente (y otro ausente),  Mills consigue elaborar un ambiente suficientemente pavoroso pare recrear la angustia de una persona ante el miedo.
A pesar de que sea el ruido  uno de los elementos inherente en todo el cortometraje, apenas es perceptible el sonido en toda la película, funcionando la dicotomía sonido-silencio hasta el extremo de que, el propio espectador, es consciente, hacia el final del cortometraje de sus propios ruidos.
Oscura (con una gran fotografía), kafkiana (tanto por tema como por ciertos guiños) y de un agobio psicológico (digno de Funny games), la película de Mills consigue en poco más de 10 minutos crear un película de terror psicológico de alta altura.

Saturday, February 09, 2013

Israel in Syria


It is abundantly clear that Israel has been involved in every Arab (and several non-Arab) civil and inter-state wars over the decades. There is hardly a civil war in which Israel was not criminally involved on the side of the most reactionary party. From Yemen to Lebanon, Jordan, Sudan, Western Sahara, Oman and Iraq, Israel has consistently involved itself – usually on the side of a repressive regime, or a repressive army or militia. Israel has been involved in the affairs of Lebanon since the 1950s, at least.
Israel has also been involved in Syrian affairs for decades. The story of Elie Cohen has been told too many times, and the failure of Cohen – it is rarely mentioned in the Western heroic portrayal of him that he was after all caught, which is not the ultimate prize for any spy – has been covered up in all those pro-Israeli movies and books. Cohen basically opened a brothel in Damascus on behalf of the Mossad, and hoped that drunken officers and low-level government clerks would open up late into the night. It has never been established that Cohen really obtained crucial secrets as was claimed. And Arab enemies of Amin Hafiz [leader of the 1963 coup that brought the Baath party to power in Syria and subsequent president] and Israeli propagandists both promoted the false story about links between Hafiz and Cohen.
Israel, of course, regards the eruption of civil war in any Arab country as a golden opportunity to enter the scene, usually with the assistance of one of the two sides of the conflict. Syria has not been as safe as Lebanon has been for Israeli espionage, but this may soon change. There are already Western media reports about the arrival of Mossad terrorists in Syria, through the entrances that are run by Turkey and their client, the Free Syrian Army. The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood has had direct and indirect relations with Israel for years. They have been allies of the Jordanian King Hussein (by his own admission in a famous televised speech that Hafez al-Assad compelled him to make) and of the pro-Israeli right-wing militias in Lebanon during the civil war. Israeli weapons reached the Muslim Brotherhood militias through the Phalanges in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
It is too early to write about the Israeli role in the Syrian conflict but American officials – for purely domestic reasons – are quite transparent that Israel is consulted on every Western decision concerning Syria. In fact, the Israeli factor may be behind the American preference for the preservation of the Syrian regime, but without Bashar al-Assad. Israel remains unclear whether it wants a change of regime or not, although the proliferation of radical Islamist groups in Syria may have made Israel nervous, and Israel may have pressured the US to abstain from delivering shipments of arms to Syria. Israel, however, may be supporting certain elements of the armed opposition groups in order to gain a foothold among them.
The recent Israeli attack on Syria is not its first, and it came on the heels of the Israeli bombings of Sudan, and Gaza and the West Bank in Palestine. The objective of the Israeli bombing is not clear and the Syrian regime is typically circumspect about the Israeli target or targets. The Syrian regime typically resorted to its language about waiting to pinpoint the “time and place” of Syria and said – yet again – that it reserves the right to respond to Israeli aggression. There was little condemnation from the side of the exile Syrian opposition, despite whispered mumblings here and there and some effortful words by a few individuals who claimed that they are not happy about the Israeli bombing (the lip service that the Syrian March 14 movement pays to the cause of enmity towards Israel is a replica of the Lebanese March 14 version).
And the Syrian regime, despite its pathetic lack of a response to past acts of Israeli aggression against Syria, is now in a more difficult position. If it does not act in response to Israeli aggression, it will be quite embarrassing for the regime to justify the use of fighter jets and helicopter gunships in its internal conflict (for purposes of regime preservation), but not for defending Syrian territory against Israeli attacks. The Syrian army, which has by and large remained loyal to the regime, could face major defections in protest against this regime reluctance. But if the regime responds to Israeli attacks, Israel can inflict severe damage to the military power of the regime which is needed to protect the regime. Either way, the regime could suffer, although it would change the contours of the conflict if it were to respond against Israel in a major way.
Israel must be nervous as the earth all around it shakes vigorously. The region today is quite different from the quiet environment that Israel has been accustomed to since the US and Sadat removed the Egyptian army from the Arab-Israeli conflict. But the changes in the region are not complete and the earth will continue to shake until some form of political or maybe revolutionary transformation takes shape. It is not easy to predict the final outcome, but it is possible to predict that the region will increasingly look unsafe for Israeli occupation and aggression. That in itself is good news.

Saturday, February 02, 2013

Aerial Photographs of Tulip Fields in the Netherlands by Normann Szkop










Abstract rainbows of color fill the landscape in these beautiful photos by French photographer Normann Szkop (nsfw-ish) who hopped in a Cesna with pilot Claython Pender to soar above the tulip fields in Anna Paulowna, a town in North Holland. Collectively, the millions of neatly planted flowers create sprawling patterns and designs that tourists flock to witness with their own eyes every season. See the entire 100+ photograph set over on Flickr. (via Colossal)