CHICAGO BOTANICAL GARDENS

Japanese Garden

ECHO GRAFFITI

PIXADORES

SÃO PAULO GRAFFITI ARTISTS

If you hear the words “Pixo” or “Pixadores”, you can be nowhere else but in Sao Paulo. Sao Paulo is the biggest city in South America and indeed the southern hemisphere. It also has the particularity of being a town completely surrounded and flooded by the Pixadores’ graffiti pieces. You can find them nowhere else in the world. If you walk through Sao Paulo’s streets at night and pay attention to your surroundings, you will see shapes moving along the walls of buildings. 

SÃO PAULO

São Paulo; Saint Paul is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city proper in the southern hemisphere  and the Americans and the world's seventh largest city  by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paul metropolitan area, ranked as the second most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among the ten largest metropolitan areas on the planet. São Paulo is the capital of the state of São Paul , Brazil's most populous state. It exerts strong regional influence in commerce, finance, arts and entertainment and a strong international influence.  The name of the city honors Saint Paul of Tarsus. 

ON LINE GALLERY

So Photography galleries are going on line these days, great way to "introduce" work or gather a community of like minded folks. But seeing work in person, holding a print and seeing the light reflect off the surface can not be replaced with a computer screen.

http://stuartpilkington.co.uk/bookfilmpainting/index.html

Stuart Pilkington  is working hard at creating a robust photo community

POSTCARD PERFECT

Long Island is an island in the Bahamas that is split by the Tropic of Cancer. Its capital is Clarence Town. Long Island is one of the Districts of the Bahamas and is known as the most scenic island in the Bahamas. The population is roughly 3,000 inhabitants.

Long Island is about 130 kilometers long and 6 km wide at its widest point. The land area is 596 km. Long Island is situated about 265 km southeast of the Bahamian capital of Nassau, which is located on the island of New Providence. The Tropic of Cancer runs through the northern quarter of the island.

The northeast side of Long Island is noted for its steep rocky headlands, while the southwest coast is noted for its broad white beaches with soft sand. The terrain ranges widely throughout the island, including white flat expanses from which salt is extracted, swamplands, beaches, and sloping (in the north) and low (in the south) hills.

Long Island is particularly noted for its caves, which have played a major role in the island's history. Dean's Blue Hole, located west of Clarence Town, is the world's deepest underwater sinkhole, dropping to a depth of about 200 meters, making it more than double the depth of most other large holes.

Long Island is surrounded by small bays and inlets, including the large New Found Harbor west of Deadman's Cay, at approximately the midsection of the island. There are also smaller islands off-shore, including Sandy Cay.

The island was originally called by the Arawak name "Yuma." It was rechristened "Fernandina" by Christopher Columbus  on his first voyage in 1492, during which Long Island is believed to have been his third stop, following San Salvador and Rum Cay to the east. Archaeological evidence, including ceremonial stools called duhos, shows that the Lucayan Taino tribe settled on Long Island, probably in the island's cave system. After the demise of the Lucayans, who were carried as slaves to Hispaniola  and Cuba, there was no large settlement until the arrival of the Loyalists. 

The original Loyalists were mainly from New England and New Jersey and arrived on Long Island after fleeing the American Revolution . These families started the first farms, primarily raising cattle and sheep. By the 1790s, settlers began to arrive from the Carolina and proceeded to set up cotton plantations. The plantations flourished for only a few years and, by the time of the abolition of salvery  in 1834, most had collapsed and been abandoned. There are many ruins from this era today, the majority of which are overgrown by bush. There are also remains of some of the houses built after slavery, which are usually small and built of stone. Originally, they had thatched roofs; today, most are shingled. The descendants of these families continue to be widespread on the island