You ask why I live
alone in the birch forest,
and I smile and am silent
until even my soul grows quiet...
You ask why I live
alone in the birch forest,
and I smile and am silent
until even my soul grows quiet...
...I will lie down on the wet grass and look at the swaying tops of the thirsty young birch trees...
And early on a beautiful bright spring morning, I go outside and take a deep breath of the birth of a spring day...
Sometimes, thankfully very rarely, I can't get back to sleep after I've woken up in the middle of the night. Then I get up and go to the kitchen, get some hot water from the thermos and pour it into the leftover tea from the evening before.
While enjoying the tea with small sips, I walk to the window and look outside for a few minutes...
I love this tree, standing strong no matter the weather and season. Day and night, in darkness and in full light, it tells stories to those who take time to listen.
What do you do when it storms? Do you curl up on the couch with a book and a cup of tea? Or do you go outside during a "mild" storm?
I do the latter. I like to go out for a short walk in the open field, along a lake or on the beach, to feel the power of the wind and enjoy the constantly changing skies. After that walk, when I come home, I'll do the curling up with a cup of tea... 😉
When I still lived in the Netherlands, I liked to bike to this tree every now and then, to spend some time there in the early morning silence on the bank of the river Maas, enjoying ever changing light.
For this work I used a photo that I made at the beginning of autumn. The tree was still full of leaves, and the leaves were still beautifully green.
We stroll along a beech-lined path in the forest, and we enjoy the winter light playing on the leafless branches and tree trunks...
The day after the storm, the sea is calm, the beach empty: for kilometers we don't meet a soul. The waterline guides us on our walk, showing us the way in the emptiness . . .
On a stormy day, it is wonderful to take a walk on the beach, like here on the beach of Schiermonnikoog, one of the Dutch Wadden islands...
Published today in The Ekphrastic Review, a collaboration with Laura Ann Reed based on -a little bit color adjusted version of- my artwork 'The Yellow Umbrella'.
The photo that I used to create this artwork is made with an Eastman Kodak No. 2 Folding Cartridge Hawk-Eye Model B camera, manufactured more than 90 years ago, between the years 1926 and 1934.
A quiet afternoon in early spring, silence lies like a blanket over the marshes. The wind whispers softly in the reeds, telling stories from around the world and of all times.
Lilac dreams in the sky,
veiled by light,
floating on the wind
After a crisp summer night, the first rays of sunlight hit the damp fields. A light haze rises and disappears to the horizon, carried by an emerging summer breeze....
It's a warm winter day, after a few sunny days the fields are gently turning green. A walk early in the morning, the rising sun just rising above the hills. A veil of mist rises from the cold lake, drifting across the fields with a gentle breeze.
Early on a beautiful spring morning I wandered through the fields along the bay Krik Vig, part of the Limfjord. Except for the rustling of the wind and a few birds, it's quiet…
The humid morning air and a fresh sea breeze blend the colors and scents of a beautiful new day.
A gray, foggy day. A day like so many, where you only see vague outlines of the path you are walking. The silence and lack of sight are oppressive at first. Until you regain peace and confidence, and let the trees guide you.
It's early in the morning. It has been snowing all night, there is no one else in the forest. Carefully you take a step into the fresh snow….
It is cold, the sun does not have enough power to warm the fresh breeze. The trees are still bare, but on many branches the first leaf buds are beginning to unfold.
Early in the morning the light penetrates into the darkest corners of the forest. After every night, a new day arrives…
The fields are covered with a thin layer of snow. The world waits in stillness for the night to come.
It was so quiet that afternoon, just before sunset... No wind, no birds, no cars... Nothing.
As if the world had been completely abandoned.
A winter day awakens, the colors growing brighter, more intense, as I slip out of a dream...
It is a beautiful, sunny and windy winter day when we climb the high dunes on the coast of the North Sea. Reaching the top of a dune, we sit down, in the sun and a bit sheltered from the wind. The horizon is barely visible because of a haze of fine drops of seawater. Even the wind tastes salty...
The part of Denmark where we live is known for the beautiful Nordic light. The sunsets over the North Sea and the fjords and lakes in autumn and winter are magical, at least: if there is not too much cloud cover. When I made the photo for this artwork, the conditions were perfect: a humid atmosphere and veil clouds.
Early on a beautiful summer morning, the medieval village of Corenno Plinio on Lake Como awakens. Sunlight plays across the roofs, strokes the high parts of the facades. Narrow streets, old worn stairs...
A cold and stormy winter morning on the beach of the North Sea near Agger, North West Denmark. Seagulls hover on the wind, waiting for the sea to bring them something to eat. Diving down, sometimes landing on the water, and not always successful in catching something edible...
Early in the morning, the first light of the rising sun lovingly embraces nature's awakening...
The sun sets under a heavily clouded sky, and for a brief moment shines over a slightly frozen Limfjord near the village of Amtoft, North Jutland, Denmark.
...
All I want is to see how
the setting sun colors the garden
in the ripples
of a winter breeze.
Light. Hidden
behind a veil of silence
of the fading darkness
Celebrate this new day
Every day
The past year for us has been about tearing down, and rebuilding. Demolishing what was rotten or no longer served us, and considering what we wanted to keep and perhaps reuse.
Musing trees in morning mist,
the new day hesitates and knows
they lose themselves in memories
It's still early in the quiet foggy forest. The new day seems to hesitate to start, so as not to disturb the trees at their musing.
It is still dark, very cold and quiet, this early morning in the lightly snow-covered forest. But then the sun rises, the light plays with the frozen branches of the fir trees...
It's early on a cold, dark winter morning. At dusk, everything seems to be the colour blue. Then the sun rises, coloring the world in an amazing palette.
I love Fado music and, more in general, Portuguese folk music.
One of the most beautiful Portuguese songs for me is Meu Alentejo sung by Dulce Pontes.
But even without knowing a translation of the lyrics (and I don't speak a word of Portuguese), this song really touched me the first time I heard it. And it still does...
A dark evening in a city where it is raining briskly. The street is almost deserted, shopkeepers have just turned out the lights and closed their stores. Two people are walking down the street talking and laughing under a yellow umbrella. I feel a strange desire to know what the two are laughing about....
When Laura Ann Reed, a friend and poet from the US, sent me a new poem she had written, her words spoke to me so strongly that I immediately had a vision that for me matched her words. Moreover, I also immediately knew which two 10-year-old photos I had to put together to make the image I had in mind.
Fresh snow, as far as the eye can see. The forest looks spacious, light, and larger than usual. It is quiet, and the world feels deserted. Only the muffled crunch of our footsteps in the fresh snow.
Soft waving reeds in a chilly breeze. The ripples on the icy water make it hard to see anything below the surface. An ideal hiding place for dreams…
The sun has set, the water of the fjord rapidly takes on the cold color of the night. Thin cloud veils seem to swallow up the colors of the sunset, until it's dark.
During a long walk in a dark and grey forest, the sun briefly but brightly breaks through the cloud cover just before sunset and illuminates the forest in fairy-tale autumn colors, as only the setting autumn sun can do.
An unexpected snowstorm blinds us
Even as we squint into the sunlight
Blinded, shivering, caught in the brightness
Turning away from its fierce glare
The burning, live-giving light
The soft, chilling snow
Flirting, sparkling, fluttering
...
After many days of rain, the late afternoon sun shines almost horizontally through the damp forest. It is quiet, except for a soft rustling, a song of the last leaves of the trees…
On a beautiful morning I wandered through the fields along the bay Krik Vig, part of the Limfjord. Except for the rustling of the wind and a single bird, it's quiet…
A more impressionistic transformation of the artwork Autumn Leaves, and that one is based on a photo that I made of the forest floor in the windy northwest corner of our garden, with a great variety in trees with leaves in all kind of shapes and colors.
The morning light and the silence in the deserted forest, create a special atmosphere. It gives space to let your thoughts run free.
An artwork that I made on the occasion of the exhibition 'El Duende' in 2017. I made two series of photos in the mountains near Bellano, Italy. When making those series, the theme of the exhibition inspired me. I went looking for the spirit of mountains and valleys.
'Sad Songs' is a new artwork in my collection 'Secret Places'. It is inspired by the recent fruitless attempts by world leaders to arrive at decisive measures, humane financial compensation and quick actions to combat the earth crisis.
It's early in the morning. The first sunlight touches the moss between the trees. And as if the forest had been waiting for it, immediately the most wonderful scents rise up and mingle with the nightly smell of thawing leaves and wood.
Spring. A gentle breeze takes the petals of fading cherry blossoms into the light. Although still far away, or perhaps just because, a new version of this artwork.
Yesterday the first version of this artwork, it went wrong again with the ability to comment, so grab your chance at this new, digitally transformed version 😉
"You white men are lost. You don't understand the land. Too many silly questions.
Your presence on this earth will come to an end.
amid wild cherry blossoms overcome by fragrance
my fury
sank to its knees
...
It's low tide, the bottom of the fjord becomes visible. The waves have left their marks, like every intense event in life...
Early in the morning, it's quiet after a night full of mysterious sounds. Suddenly the first sunlight hits the tops of the pine trees, the forest awakes.
A walk in the forest early on an autumn morning. Do you know that wonderful scent of moist autumn leaves that are heated by a shower of sunlight?
Evening arrives, turning the trees into feathers of light.
An autumn walk through the beautiful forest Dover Plantation, near the town of Hurup Thy in North Jutland, Denmark.
It is cold in the darkening forest, the late afternoon sun yet makes an attempt to warm the trunks of the trees...
Some people dream in color, other's in black and white. Many people are not sure, or hardly remember their dreams. I am quite sure I sometimes dream in surrealistic color palettes and atmospheres. But as far as I remember, my dreams are always multicolored...
Life is precious; we only have one. But what if you had as many lives as the balloon salesman has balloons in his hand?
We are witnessing the beginning of a pitch-black period.
For all those who care about nature, about the oppressed, about justice and democracy.
And for those who care about the rights of women, of those with a different opinion, sexual orientation, of those with a colored skin...
It is the first week of November, more than 3 weeks before that terrible day. And the first advertisements are already appearing.
So it is high time that I post again the works from the series Colorful Days....
If, with this mini series, I manage to persuade just 1 person to buy less this year, or maybe even not to participate in the madness called Black Friday, the earth will have made a small victory....
In all the turmoil of the world, there are trees that remain standing perfectly straight. Offering protection and holding on no matter how severe the storm rages around them. Deeply rooted, connected to the earth and to the trees around them.
It is a stormy autumn day when, during a short vacation on Schiermonnikoog, we decide to make a beach walk. Schiermonnikoog is one of the Wadden Islands on the north coast of the Netherlands.
Yesterday I climbed up the hill
But halfway there, the wind and fog made climbing hard
The grass slippery with moisture,
and smelling of wet leaves and autumn
I heard a song, it helped me to continue on my way
Once at the top I used the moss as a pillow
while the voices of the wind in the trees soothed me to sleep.
About two years ago were intensely enjoying our introduction to Vietnamese coffee. We only drink 1 cup of coffee a day, so when you taste a beautiful coffee for the first time and it is your only cup that day, you enjoy it with very small sips.
When my cup was empty, I looked, as always, at the "markings" the coffee grounds had left on the bottom.
I grind and brew my coffee by hand, pouring it through a metal mesh filter, so there is always some sediment in there. Mmmmmm.... 🙂
The 'drawing' I saw fascinated me, and inspired me to create this artwork.
It is a great pleasure to mention here the 3 inspiring women who, without knowing it, participated in this creation.
Niloofar Mahafel, a wonderful painter from Iran, now living in Moskow, who trusts me to be her representative AND sent me many photos of the wonderful Iranian landscape. They are a huge inspiration ! No doubt she will recognize the picture of one of her beautiful landscapes in this artwork.
Daphne Nguyen, she introduced me to the coffee coming from her company's coffee farms in Vietnam. We love this coffee, the passion she and her colleagues have for coffee and the enormous commitment to the coffee farmers. I'm sure she never expected that her coffee would become the basis for an artwork...
Karina Mosser (find her website here), a wonderful painter and a great person to work with. Some time ago she made a series of abstracts for me to use as background for my digital creations. Through a green abstract painting of hers, I managed to create a work that brings together Iran and Vietnam as a landscape for my "coffee tree".
The artwork 'Voices In The Mist' is a new work in my collection 'Secret Places'. It is a digital transformation of 3 photographs, and will be printed with high-quality ink on museum-quality, acid-free cotton/rag paper (Hahnemühle Photo Rag® 308gsm). The work comes in a limited edition of 10, signed and with a certificate of authenticity. But of course, it is also available as Open Edition print, without signature and not numbered. Available in any size you desire !
Maximum size is 250Wx125H cm / 100wx50H inches. The work can be printed in any size up to that maximum, so please let me know the size you would prefer.
I start with one or more photographs made by myself to create these artworks. Then I use digital painting, color adjusting and adding and transforming multiple artistic effects, until a surrealistic atmosphere is created that touches me and tells the story I want to tell.
Prints of 'Voices In The Mist' are available, ask for a quote or contact me through a message. Prints are also available in my Saatchi Art portfolio at the artwork page and here (smaller limited edition).
Through my artworks I ask you to reflect for a moment on the nature around you, on the beautiful feeling that nature can evoke. Thus to think about your actions to support the wellbeing of the earth and everything that lives on it. And on what humanity loses when many of us continue on the destructive path of ever more greed and consuming. And please, reflect on how you can survive in this rapidly changing world…
So do you want to know your ecological footprint?
Then visit this website: https://www.footprintcalculator.org/home/en
And do you want to reduce your ecological footprint?
Then ask me, I will help you. For free. Or simply visit my website and choose in the menu for Your Footprint.
And if you appreciate my writings and art and want to support me, you can buy me a piece of fruit here: https://ko-fi.com/jacobberghoef, thank you 🍏 !
Interested in more? Then read what I wrote about System Change, Man's impact on the earth, Organic Change, Regenerative Agriculture, Regeneration
Lying on our backs in the woods, we observe nature's symphony flying above, and the gentle dance of light amid the trees—a phenomenon known as Shinrin-Yoku, or "forest bathing," celebrated in Japan. It refreshes the body and mind, enhancing health and well-being.
Sickness, loss, violence, life-threatening circumstances, dying.... There are many moments in a person's life when she/he is held captive in icy darkness.
But whatever you believe in, ultimately there is the embrace and oneness with the light of your origin.
A walk on a rain-soaked path along a canal on a winter evening. It's getting dark, time to go home...
The days of cold autumn rain. Looking out over drowned fields, ten years ago in the province of Groningen, The Netherlands.
Autumn is a beautiful time, a time when nature tenderly covers the fallen seeds with brown and vibrant colored leaves. Food for the new growing season...
A gray, foggy autumn day. A day like so many, where you only see vague outlines of the path you are walking. The silence and lack of sight are oppressive at first...
After a beautiful late summer week mid September, it's autumn now. The temperature has dropped considerably but it is still very pleasant to work outside. The past week even 'warm' for this time of the year.
Many trees are now mostly bare, but the maple is still holding its coloring leaves firmly. And the leaves of the hawthorn look like they could stay on the trees for many weeks to come.
Early in the morning after a rainy and windy autumn night. The first light of the rising sun lovingly embraces nature's awakening...
A beautiful autumn morning. I go outside to walk the dog. We see the horizon 'releasing' the sun, its warm light kisses the clouds above the fields.
While the ice caps are melting and the oceans and seas are warming and being robbed, polluted and poisoned, also on land the humans leave a trace of destruction. Or perhaps better to say, that's where the misery begins. Because that's where humans have settled and do most of their 'ingenuity'.
The Western world should really be called the 'world of never enough'.
A weekend read...
After a beautiful late summer week mid September, it's autumn now. The temperature has dropped considerably, rain showers are frequent, although not very heavy.
Many leaves have been blown off the trees and bushes the past two weeks, we are collecting those fallen leaves from the paths and grass almost daily and putting them in a large mesh basket so they can compost in the coming months.
Screaming sounds of power
saws numb your thoughts
Ears bleed, hearts tear
Forests cry
The sun colors the evening in
the hues of the choking smoke
that kills tree after tree
How high may become
the price the future
will have to pay?
Thick clouds of black
smoke darken the sun
Eyes tear,
trees cry
The sun colors the evening
in the hues of the flames that
scorch tree after tree
How high may become
the price the future
will have to pay?
September 14, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
In the tranquil medieval village of Corenno Plinio, narrow streets and old stairs evoke a time long past, with few signs of modern tourism. The artwork 'Awakening (3)' from the 'Lost Cities' collection is a digitally altered photograph, aiming to capture a surrealistic atmosphere.
Everything in a swamp seems thinner, fragile almost, untouchable….
At the same time, it is not difficult to feel part of the landscape. The silence absorbs you, the mists make you feel like you are floating above the water.
So getting lost in the pale light is very easy when you stroll around for a few hours...
'Today we have used up resources for an entire year, we are now living at the expense of future generations'.
Is that it, or is there more to it?
I sit on a stone,
on the east side of the pond
Staring at the water,
waiting.
Nobody understands why
All I want is to see how
the setting sun colors the flowers
in the ripples
of a summer breeze.
July 21, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
Subscribe to get access to the rest of this post and other subscriber-only content.
It is early morning on a beautiful, sunny but damp spring day. Sunlight warms the forest floor, patches of fog rise. The trees seem to be moving, appearing out of the mist, as if they are gathering for their morning meeting.
Awakening Fields - Early morning. Relatively warm southern winds blow across the fields. Colors emerge, the land seems to awaken from its deep sleep.
An Island - A small island of reed and grass in a wintery cold Baltic Sea, atb the south west coast of Sweden. The sun shines between the clouds and hits the island, lighting it up in a special way.
Endless Road - A dark, gray and rainy day in June. It is beginning to get dark and the wind is finally abating. A curtain of rain obscures the view. But I know this road, I know we're almost home.
July 3, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
Silent forest
A tree hums
Dark sound
Forests often have an enchanting atmosphere. The murmur of leaves enhances the silence, the dim light hides a lot of details... At the same time, scarce light can give objects a different, mysterious form. And a creaking branch will make you look around to discover...
June 29, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
In the rhythm of our wings...
Soulmates... Fellow travellers on our journey of life, helping to grow beyond the horizons of our individual selves.
It is nice to have a soulmate, a privilege. But not a given, nor conditional for a happy life.
June 28, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
Do you know the sound of green? No? Then listen to the birds in the trees after the rain.
And do you know the scent of green? Take a stroll through a wet spring forest, and you will never forget this wonderful scent.
Some time ago we spent a few days on the beautiful island of Langeland.
On a rainy day we went to the northern half of the island...
Fleeing winds
lash the beach,
trying to hide
Sometimes you feel a strong wind so gusting on your body that it seems like the wind itself is fleeing from something and trying to push you aside because you are in her way...
When I see
the colors of the sunset
the sparkles on the water
waves finding rest on the shore...
I no longer wish. I am
A sunny day at the beach of the North Sea, just north of the town of Agger in Denmark.
Winter retreats
dressed in bright white and silver
arranging the fresh green
A blue sky and the fading shades of white and silver of the trees, welcome the beautiful green of the arriving spring !
Tangled Trees
Trees tangled
together in green
A lonely road,
deep
into the woods
Shelter for the cold
May rain
A dark, chilly and rainy day in May. At some point the rain comes pouring down. But luckily, a beautiful lane with a tightly tangled canopy of leaves provides shelter.
Come with me to have a party in the cherry tree ! Take a look at the transformation from blossom to mature fruit.
Sketched By Cherry's Light
Spring rain passed
A cherry tree in bloom
Sketched by morning light
Sketched By Light is a series of photos...
Late in the evening after a sunny day. The sun is about to set, the world is waiting for the night to come. Dark rain clouds cover the sky over the lake, a rain shower passes by.
On the threshold of spring, I walk through the woods early on a cold and misty morning. Shreds of mist rise from the ground, the day is beginning.
A forest in the mist is fascinating and mysterious
At the end of a gray spring day, a light breeze rises and the mist that has lain like a blanket over the land and sea all day disappears.
We all know that spring brings new life to the unfamiliar forest, no matter how dark it can be there. New life, nourishing for everything alive.
Yet there is a fear of entering that unknown, that darkness.
But knowing we need that renewal, I set out. Will you join me, come after me?
March 3, 2024 — Comments are off for this post.
Huge amounts of toxic
content drowns the lands
Dead eyes,
the earth cries
The sun colors the morning
in the hues of dead trees
on the banks of greed
How high may become
the price the future
will have to pay?
" The computing power for AI models requires immense – and increasing – amounts of natural resources. Legislation is required to prevent environmental crisis.* "
Why can companies develop products and services that are a danger to a human being or even humanity? And that even without making a proper risk assessment beforehand and submitting it for approval to a government agency that judges on objective criteria that protect humanity and its home?
And why, after the production and delivery of a product or service is no longer of interest to them, can companies turn around and walk away with pockets bulging with money, after which a government becomes responsible for the damage and you and I foot the bill?
So why do you and I accept that we are footing the bill for the second time? Didn’t we already pay heavily for the highly profitable products and services for the companies as well?
And why do you and I allow money, the ultimate driver of greed, to rule us to a degree that our children and grandchildren will end up in a world that is completely poisoned and unlivable, even in those locations where Western man has been able to build his destructive world in a comfortably mild climate for the past millennia?
Are we so addicted to consuming that we do not care at all, or that we think (hope) that inventiveness and not yet existing technology will bring the solution to problems that are already so big that we cannot comprehend the consequences? And that while technology has never yet brought an solution to a big problem without in turn creating new, often bigger problems?
So tell me, what do you think a 1.5-degree temperature rise in the next decade will mean for the earth in - let's say - 150 years if it is not also and above all accompanied by an immediate end to greenhouse gas emissions, pollution and poisoning of air, water and land, depletion of the earth, destruction of biodiversity, ...?
Do you really grant your grandchildren and/or the grandchildren of your family and friends, that world?
* Note: we are already in a huge environmental quadruple crisis. Are we longing for one more?
Link to the article the quote in the beginning of this post is referring too.
Artwork: Earth Cries (2), by me (of course...)
Text continues below the image
'Earth Cries (2)' is a new artwork in my collection 'Drowned Earth', prints are available, contact me for a quote.
Through my artworks I ask you to reflect for a moment on the nature around you, on the beautiful feeling that nature can evoke. Thus to think about your actions to support the wellbeing of the earth and everything that lives on it. And on what humanity loses when many of us continue on the destructive path of ever more greed and consuming. And please, reflect on how you can survive in this rapidly changing world…
So do you want to know your ecological footprint?
Then visit this website: https://www.footprintcalculator.org/home/en
And do you want to reduce your ecological footprint?
Then ask me, I will help you. For free. Or simply visit my website and choose in the menu for Your Footprint.
And if you appreciate my writings and art and want to support me, you can buy me a piece of fruit here: https://ko-fi.com/jacobberghoef, thank you 🍏 !
So are you interested in more? Then read what I wrote about System Change, Man's impact on the earth, Organic Change, Regenerative Agriculture, Regeneration
Want to inquire about an art piece?
All content © 2014-2025 Jacob Berghoef (Jaap Berghoef)