Wow, the Campo di Fiori images are just wonderful. I am particularly drawn to the long shot down the side with the men with the push-carts and the Vespa in the foreground. It is superb. I remember the square well from the late 70s and early 80s. Not much has changed. The Vatican with the lady speaking with the Swiss Guards is equally lovely, it feels very open. There is time to chat, no risk of anyone doing anything stupid. Your memories are crisp and clear and you tell a great story accompanied by a great set of images. Really, really lovely! Thank you very much for this wonderful set.
Thank you very much, Søren! The Campo dei Fiori photos are my favorites of this post too. I’m glad to hear you liked them. Speaking of the market photos, would you consider one of them to be ‘humanist’ in genre?
Thank you, Eric! I would have to look up in what neighborhood I shot that photo of the repair shop (by looking at the negatives before and after it). I’ll let you know if I find out.
This is truly a wonderful post. What strikes me in particular is the fact that these photos were taken in the eighties which (to me) isn't that long ago. I was around ten years old when you took these photos, but some of them (especially the one from Campo dei fiori, but also the little girl in the rosticceria and the angry man smoking) look like they could have been from the forties or fifties or even older. I also find it impressive how many details you remember from when you made these photos forty years ago. But I guess the photos themselves help you to remember the situation. It's why they are so important. You could make a book with all your Rome photos. I think they are really special.
Thank you, Birgitte, you are very kind! I agree, some of these could have been made before 1984, but maybe we see it that way, because time wasn’t moving so fast in those days (or because I’m getting really old). The photos do make me remember all the details, and I think I was in a state of constant alertness; Rome was a very impressive event for me. A book...I feel flattered, but I don't think they are that good, although I'm certainly proud of some photos. Thanks again!
What a wonderful set of memories, Vincent🤍🖤! I enjoyed this series very much, reminiscing about my own (very naive) first attempts at film photography. No wonder you had a great eye for detail, studying art history!
Thank you, Suzy! There is something in my earIier photos that is spontaneous, but your calling your own early work naive (which it probably isn’t), made me rethink. Maybe it’s always a mix of spontaneity and naivety when we’ve just started photography (I had been shooting 4 years at the time, and had some practice and guidance, but not much), resulting in both clumsiness and boldness, or sometimes only one of those. I don’t know exactly in what way my art history background influenced my photography, but I’m sure it did.
Again, very happy to see your new Roman memory. I enjoyed your descriptions so much. I was a very young Romanian girl, traveling very rarely abroad with my parents before the Iron Curtain fall. We went to Greece in 1980 I think, and there must be some slides from that era at my parents' house, although Dad says they must have faded out completely by now. Rome looks very much as I saw it in the movies from that era. How wonderful is the professor and older lady with the map photo! And the young boy with the macchinetta. And the angry dude at the bar (looks like Antonioni from that angle. And yes, the dude on the Spanish steps is very John Denver). I wonder if Marcello still has the cafe? Thank you for this amazing time travel.
Thank you for these beautiful comments, Crina! To start with that last question: I have tried to find something about that rosticceria online, but haven’t found anything yet. Slides…I have my mother’s slides at my house, and started scanning them, or rather what’s left of them (some bad cases of fungus and decoloration there), but I’m considering another approach, as it’s simply too much work.
The thing with these memories is that they are all still so vivid; the angry man at the bar, I remember that scene as if it happened only a few years back. He may look like Antonioni a bit, but he was one of the most annoying people I’ve come across in Rome, he clearly didn't know much about human interaction, which Antonioni most obviously did. Anyway, I’m happy you liked this part of my series too!
Thank you, Shital! That man was obnoxious, and editing the photo made me remember the smallest details of what happened. One of the many wonderful things photography can do.
Excellent photos and narrative, Vincent. Your memories of that trip are wonderful.
I too have an Olympus OM10 that I’ve owned since the mid-eighties. It’s a great camera. I haven’t used it for 30+ years but I’ve got a roll of black and white film in the fridge that’s screaming to be used. Maybe I’ll take it out soon as your post has inspired me.
Thank you, Mark! The OM10 is a great camera indeed, because it was so easy to handle and operate, that’s why I wrote a few lines about the nonsense of chasing certain cameras that now cost a small fortune, while there are still thousands of OM10s, and many other great cameras from that era, that can be picked up for next to nothing. And that 50 mm 1.8 is a superb lens!
I would really like to see photos you may take with your OM 10! I thought something similar a while back. Maybe we could do a collaboration of some kind with our analogue Olympus stuff?
I definitely like the idea of a collaboration of some kind, Vincent. I’ll need to run some film through the camera first to make sure it still works and, if it does, I’m all in.
The same goes for me, I have the camera and the film’s no problem, but I haven’t been using the camera for a while. I think I’ll try my OM 2N, that’s the last one I’ve replaced the seal foam of (still, some 20 years ago). I look forward to it, going to put a roll in it tomorrow to see if the seal looks alright. Let’s think about how we go about it in the meantime. If I have an idea, I’ll let you know!
What incredible, striking images--and such variety! I also really enjoyed the commentary/color you provided alongside the visual portals into a place and time. Loved this line: "I will never know. That may be one of the charms of street photography."
One of my favorites, not already mentioned by others, is the capture with the old ladies, the map, and the cross. I'm trying to understand why and I think it's that in addition to the body language telling such a vivid story, and creating an interesting composition, there's expansive negative space that leads my eye upwards to the unexpected dramatic flourish of a singular object, a large cross.
Thank you, Chandler! It’s all the questions that will never be answered, that are part of what makes old photos intriguing. The cross in the photo you mention is so dominant, I wondered if anybody would even notice the weird body language of the three people sitting under it. I’m glad you enjoyed this post, thanks again!
There are some truly strong photographs here. Overall, they carry a powerful sense of nostalgia, which feels only natural when looking at decades-old black-and-white images. A few stand out to me in particular: the sleeping man on the broken bench, the owner talking with local customers, the fruit sellers, and the man smoking. What also strikes me is the remarkable clarity — the crumbling facades and the fashion of the 80s come through beautifully. Thanks for sharing this post.
Thank you, Pavel! The sense of nostalgia may be natural, but I am definitely a very nostalgic person; you’re not the first person to notice that in my photos (which is a bit odd actually, because it presumes I have some pre-nostalgic way of photographing, taking photos to feed my future nostalgia).
I enjoy reading about which ones you liked, and about that clarity, it’s just the way I digitized the negatives, nothing hat I did differently than what I did with my other photos. Thanks again!
Thank you, I just saw you read and viewed those too. Surprising choice, the photo of the remnants of food and drink by the window, but I’m happy you liked it. Thanks again for viewing all three posts, highly appreciated!
Perhaps it is a surprising choice but i feel that one is the most story-telling one, it has the most of that intimate human presence … the other one i keep thinking about is the car with a broken window on the narrow street …
I thought that might be the reason, the others lacked human presence, and don’t feel very personal at all, the car with the broken window-photo does have at least some clear traces of life. I wanted to set the photos without people apart, but (luckily) there’s life everywhere!
I agree. the others have human presence too but in a different way I guess, less intimate perhaps but they have different beauty…. Like the columns for instance have a beauty of symmetry and presence I like the crop of that one a lot… so each has something very special but then for some unknown personal reasons my mind stays with the one with the food by the window.
Hi Tony, many thanks for liking, restacking and commenting on this post. Just making a selection of photos to put in this post was a joy already, it brought back so many memories, some of which are in the text. I agree that realizing this was long ago, but still well within a lifespan, makes it more interesting, because it’s so evident how much has changed already.
Hi Eric, I think the repair shop must have been in Trastevere or Lazio; the photos before were made in the Vatican museum and from the ponte Vittore Emanuele II, and after, close to the Pantheon and on route to the villa Borghese (which was near where we stayed, the via Omero).
Thank you, Ralph! That's a very fancy word for a very sad human being, what a terrible guy! The owner told me afterwards he never liked the guy anyway, which I totally understood.
Wow, the Campo di Fiori images are just wonderful. I am particularly drawn to the long shot down the side with the men with the push-carts and the Vespa in the foreground. It is superb. I remember the square well from the late 70s and early 80s. Not much has changed. The Vatican with the lady speaking with the Swiss Guards is equally lovely, it feels very open. There is time to chat, no risk of anyone doing anything stupid. Your memories are crisp and clear and you tell a great story accompanied by a great set of images. Really, really lovely! Thank you very much for this wonderful set.
Thank you very much, Søren! The Campo dei Fiori photos are my favorites of this post too. I’m glad to hear you liked them. Speaking of the market photos, would you consider one of them to be ‘humanist’ in genre?
Most definitely. You are a humanist! 😀
That’s a real compliment, coming from you, and I’m not even Italian!(reference to a conversation we had)
Another good one! The Campo de' Fiori and furniture repair photos are lovely. Is the furnature repair shot from Testaccio?
Thank you, Eric! I would have to look up in what neighborhood I shot that photo of the repair shop (by looking at the negatives before and after it). I’ll let you know if I find out.
This is truly a wonderful post. What strikes me in particular is the fact that these photos were taken in the eighties which (to me) isn't that long ago. I was around ten years old when you took these photos, but some of them (especially the one from Campo dei fiori, but also the little girl in the rosticceria and the angry man smoking) look like they could have been from the forties or fifties or even older. I also find it impressive how many details you remember from when you made these photos forty years ago. But I guess the photos themselves help you to remember the situation. It's why they are so important. You could make a book with all your Rome photos. I think they are really special.
Thank you, Birgitte, you are very kind! I agree, some of these could have been made before 1984, but maybe we see it that way, because time wasn’t moving so fast in those days (or because I’m getting really old). The photos do make me remember all the details, and I think I was in a state of constant alertness; Rome was a very impressive event for me. A book...I feel flattered, but I don't think they are that good, although I'm certainly proud of some photos. Thanks again!
What a wonderful set of memories, Vincent🤍🖤! I enjoyed this series very much, reminiscing about my own (very naive) first attempts at film photography. No wonder you had a great eye for detail, studying art history!
Thank you, Suzy! There is something in my earIier photos that is spontaneous, but your calling your own early work naive (which it probably isn’t), made me rethink. Maybe it’s always a mix of spontaneity and naivety when we’ve just started photography (I had been shooting 4 years at the time, and had some practice and guidance, but not much), resulting in both clumsiness and boldness, or sometimes only one of those. I don’t know exactly in what way my art history background influenced my photography, but I’m sure it did.
Again, very happy to see your new Roman memory. I enjoyed your descriptions so much. I was a very young Romanian girl, traveling very rarely abroad with my parents before the Iron Curtain fall. We went to Greece in 1980 I think, and there must be some slides from that era at my parents' house, although Dad says they must have faded out completely by now. Rome looks very much as I saw it in the movies from that era. How wonderful is the professor and older lady with the map photo! And the young boy with the macchinetta. And the angry dude at the bar (looks like Antonioni from that angle. And yes, the dude on the Spanish steps is very John Denver). I wonder if Marcello still has the cafe? Thank you for this amazing time travel.
Thank you for these beautiful comments, Crina! To start with that last question: I have tried to find something about that rosticceria online, but haven’t found anything yet. Slides…I have my mother’s slides at my house, and started scanning them, or rather what’s left of them (some bad cases of fungus and decoloration there), but I’m considering another approach, as it’s simply too much work.
The thing with these memories is that they are all still so vivid; the angry man at the bar, I remember that scene as if it happened only a few years back. He may look like Antonioni a bit, but he was one of the most annoying people I’ve come across in Rome, he clearly didn't know much about human interaction, which Antonioni most obviously did. Anyway, I’m happy you liked this part of my series too!
Lovely set of images Vincent especially the man in the bar.
Thank you, Shital! That man was obnoxious, and editing the photo made me remember the smallest details of what happened. One of the many wonderful things photography can do.
Excellent photos and narrative, Vincent. Your memories of that trip are wonderful.
I too have an Olympus OM10 that I’ve owned since the mid-eighties. It’s a great camera. I haven’t used it for 30+ years but I’ve got a roll of black and white film in the fridge that’s screaming to be used. Maybe I’ll take it out soon as your post has inspired me.
Thank you, Mark! The OM10 is a great camera indeed, because it was so easy to handle and operate, that’s why I wrote a few lines about the nonsense of chasing certain cameras that now cost a small fortune, while there are still thousands of OM10s, and many other great cameras from that era, that can be picked up for next to nothing. And that 50 mm 1.8 is a superb lens!
I would really like to see photos you may take with your OM 10! I thought something similar a while back. Maybe we could do a collaboration of some kind with our analogue Olympus stuff?
I definitely like the idea of a collaboration of some kind, Vincent. I’ll need to run some film through the camera first to make sure it still works and, if it does, I’m all in.
The same goes for me, I have the camera and the film’s no problem, but I haven’t been using the camera for a while. I think I’ll try my OM 2N, that’s the last one I’ve replaced the seal foam of (still, some 20 years ago). I look forward to it, going to put a roll in it tomorrow to see if the seal looks alright. Let’s think about how we go about it in the meantime. If I have an idea, I’ll let you know!
Thanks, Vincent. Sounds good 👍🏻
What incredible, striking images--and such variety! I also really enjoyed the commentary/color you provided alongside the visual portals into a place and time. Loved this line: "I will never know. That may be one of the charms of street photography."
One of my favorites, not already mentioned by others, is the capture with the old ladies, the map, and the cross. I'm trying to understand why and I think it's that in addition to the body language telling such a vivid story, and creating an interesting composition, there's expansive negative space that leads my eye upwards to the unexpected dramatic flourish of a singular object, a large cross.
Thank you, Chandler! It’s all the questions that will never be answered, that are part of what makes old photos intriguing. The cross in the photo you mention is so dominant, I wondered if anybody would even notice the weird body language of the three people sitting under it. I’m glad you enjoyed this post, thanks again!
It seems like a different world from today. So much gentrification and pop culture has occurred in only a “few” decades.
The world certainly felt a bit different, we seem to think technological development equals progress and act accordingly.
There are some truly strong photographs here. Overall, they carry a powerful sense of nostalgia, which feels only natural when looking at decades-old black-and-white images. A few stand out to me in particular: the sleeping man on the broken bench, the owner talking with local customers, the fruit sellers, and the man smoking. What also strikes me is the remarkable clarity — the crumbling facades and the fashion of the 80s come through beautifully. Thanks for sharing this post.
Thank you, Pavel! The sense of nostalgia may be natural, but I am definitely a very nostalgic person; you’re not the first person to notice that in my photos (which is a bit odd actually, because it presumes I have some pre-nostalgic way of photographing, taking photos to feed my future nostalgia).
I enjoy reading about which ones you liked, and about that clarity, it’s just the way I digitized the negatives, nothing hat I did differently than what I did with my other photos. Thanks again!
This is a wonderful, quiet essay. The image of the man on the broken bench especially stayed with me.
Thank you, Kristine! Maybe you’d like the other posts about this same study trip too.
That was quick! :)
I look quickly and then think about it, then go back have a second look, perhaps a third … I like to notice what stays in my memory, what lingers….
Already had a look, loved the one with the food by the window. But they are all absolutely wonderful!
Thank you, I just saw you read and viewed those too. Surprising choice, the photo of the remnants of food and drink by the window, but I’m happy you liked it. Thanks again for viewing all three posts, highly appreciated!
Perhaps it is a surprising choice but i feel that one is the most story-telling one, it has the most of that intimate human presence … the other one i keep thinking about is the car with a broken window on the narrow street …
I thought that might be the reason, the others lacked human presence, and don’t feel very personal at all, the car with the broken window-photo does have at least some clear traces of life. I wanted to set the photos without people apart, but (luckily) there’s life everywhere!
I agree. the others have human presence too but in a different way I guess, less intimate perhaps but they have different beauty…. Like the columns for instance have a beauty of symmetry and presence I like the crop of that one a lot… so each has something very special but then for some unknown personal reasons my mind stays with the one with the food by the window.
Yes, I agree with the label 'humanist' here. Doesn't going back so many years make things so interesting?
Hi Tony, many thanks for liking, restacking and commenting on this post. Just making a selection of photos to put in this post was a joy already, it brought back so many memories, some of which are in the text. I agree that realizing this was long ago, but still well within a lifespan, makes it more interesting, because it’s so evident how much has changed already.
Indeed so. It’s hard to fathom how much change we have seen in our life-times. Photographs help us to appreciate (or deplore) this.
Oh, the streets of Rome are filled with rubble
Ancient footprints are everywhere
You can almost think that you’re seein’ double
On a cold, dark night on the Spanish Stairs
- Bob Dylan
Thank you, Donal! Never thought I’d receive lines from a Bob Dylan song as a comment.
The Spanish Stairs brought the song into my head. I’d love to visit Rome someday.
Hi Eric, I think the repair shop must have been in Trastevere or Lazio; the photos before were made in the Vatican museum and from the ponte Vittore Emanuele II, and after, close to the Pantheon and on route to the villa Borghese (which was near where we stayed, the via Omero).
Thank you, Shital!
An enjoyable trip back in the 'time machine', Vincent, thank you. That old guy in the little bar - something of a curmudgeon... !
Thank you, Ralph! That's a very fancy word for a very sad human being, what a terrible guy! The owner told me afterwards he never liked the guy anyway, which I totally understood.