My week in Amsterdam: A photographer’s playground

Amsterdam is a city of contrasts. The old and the new. The traditional and the modern. Cherished art from 17th-century masters and that which is extremely contemporary.

But since its founding in 1275, the “Venice of the North” has been applauded for its racial and religious tolerance, cultural diversity and picturesque splendor.

Last week, it was my pleasure to travel to the Netherlands and spend most of my trip getting lost in this wonderful city. Getting lost in cities seems to be what I do best on vacation. Since I always travel with a couple of cameras in tow, my exact daytime locale isn’t all that important. I prefer to meet up with my traveling companions later to sample the local cuisine. By the evening, I usually have my bearings.

For me, Amsterdam seemed like a photographer’s playground. Around every other turn was another photo op. The city is actually a semi-circle of dikes or wide causeways with streets on top and canals in between. A fire in 1452 destroyed three-quarters of the city, so from then on, the houses were made of brick or stone and the thatched roofs were replaced with tiles.

I love to shoot attractive architecture, and wherever there is water, there are reflections and colors, which is all great subject material. Bike riders and the brightly clothed pedestrians played a part in many of my compositions. In an old city like Amsterdam, there is also a time element about shooting certain subjects. I captured some shots that could have been made in almost any decade in the second half of the 20th century.

Besides making photographic art, I believe it’s important to experience all that a destination has to offer. So before I ever board a plane, I navigate the Internet for must-see venues.

I’d been to the castle Rijksmuseum once before in 1990, where the highlight is Holland’s most famous painter, Rembrandt, but at the time, was traveling with children. How much can you enjoy when “are we done yet” is asked like a broken record and long faces keep blocking your view of the Baroque masterpieces?

This time I went slowly and savored every sight and sound. Next door to the Rijks, is the Van Gogh Museum that is, in contrast architecturally, is super-modern. Here was the exhibit that was high on my to-do list. It was billed as the Rembrandt-Caravaggio. On loan from several museums in Italy were 25 paintings by Michelangelo, his full name being Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio. During his lifetime, he went by his last name, not his first. The exhibit compared the works of the two masters when they painted similar subjects as painters of The Golden Age most often did. In the 17th century, biblical stories were illustrated.

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