Venice through my lens | Brussels Travel Photographer

I loved Venice more than I thought I would, and I can’t quite put my finger on why. All I know is that I’m smitten and am already imagining the photos I’d like to make the next time. Photographing a place as well-known as Venice is tough because so many have already done it. It’s challenging to find a photo that hasn’t already been taken a thousand times before. I really wanted to come away with images of the city that represented more how I had experienced it, so we spent very little time at the typical tourist sites. Instead, we wandered away from the Piazza San Marco, through tiny back streets, into working neighborhoods. We woke with the sun and took the vaporetto to the colorful island of Burano, then sat on a bench in the old Jewish neighborhood, watching people. We stopped for coffee every afternoon. It took a little while and much walking to be able to see past the cliché s and find the real Venice, to seek out the everyday lives being lived right under the tourists’ noses, but I feel like I caught a glimpse. And even though I find the gondole a little cheesy, they too are a part of the fabric of Venice, and it turns out, very fun to photograph.

A colorful square in the Jewish neighborhood of Venice.

Pomegranates hanging over a walled garden in Venice.

Venice's narrow streets, both crowded and empty.

Colorful gondole crossing the Venetian Lagoon.

A very fancy couple riding in a gondola in Venice.

A line of identical white underpants hung out to dry against a pink building in Venice.

A gondolier on Venice's Grand Canal and the outside of a gondole repair shop.

Gondoliers hanging out in Venice, waiting for customers.

Wood worker's shop, with gondole oar locks hanging behind.

Fish vendor setting up early in the morning at Venice's Rialto market.

Colorful hot peppers at the Rialto market in Venice.

A flooded Piazza San Marco in Venice.

Venice's Basilica of San Marco in the early morning.

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