Bèla Adler & Salvador Fresneda Fashion and Advertising

Bèla Adler and Salvador Fresneda are a couple of Catalan photographers based between Barcelona and New York. They met in 1989 in a Duane Michals seminar. Two years later they started working together on a project assigned by Camper (The Spanish shoe company). Bèla has a degree in Graphic Design and studied Fine Arts and Art History at the University of Barcelona. She studied in Berkeley at the Fine Art Department. In 1985/86 worked one year at the graphic department of the I.C.P. in New York and attended a course on photography at the same I.C.P. Back in Spain, she took a seminar in Madrid with Joel-Peter Witkin, getting a sponsorship to continue her personal projects. Salvador is a self-made man, with a special gift for lighting and space. He also went through graphic design and attended a photography school in Barcelona. Actually, he combines photography with industrial design and interior design. He is, so to say an industrial archaeologist. He finds impressive industrial objects in markets that after transforming them, rents or uses for his own productions.

Ever since they met they have worked together, both shooting for same job. They produce and art direct almost all their works, casting, location and digital post-production. Some of their fashion clients include Burberry, Mango, Camper, Woman Secret, Vanity Fair, Loewe, Cortefiel, Caroche, Levi’s (European Campaign), Gap, Neiman Marcus, Bloomingdales, Martha Stewart, Anthropologie, Elisabeth Arden, Nordstrom, Zara, Trucco … Editorials for Spanish Vogue, Elle (Dutch), Marie Claire, El Pais, AB, Big, Matador, BGuided, Vanidad, Glamour (Spanish & German), GQ, Yo Dona, Madame, Si Style, Woman… Advertising Campaigns for BMW, DEWARS, JB, BALANTINES, FIAT, NISSAN, ERICKSON, NIKE, ROWENTA, MAGNUM (FRIGO, movie and graphic worldwide), TOUS, ROCA…

Goldfinch singing in an anechoic chamber

Epic in which the patriarch of the district leads a goldfinch to sing in an anechoic chamber, a space designed to absorb sound and annul the effects of echo and reverberation.

An anechoic chamber (an-echoic or non-echoing) is a room designed to stop reflections of either sound or electromagnetic waves. They are also insulated from exterior sources of noise. The combination of both aspects means they simulate a quiet open-space of infinite dimension, which is useful when exterior influences would otherwise give false results. The wavelength of audible sound in air falls in the same range as that of commonly used radio waves, and their propagation patterns bear many similarities. This is why both types look similar. Anechoic chambers range from small compartments to ones as large as aircraft hangars. The size of the chamber depends on the size of the objects to be tested and the frequency range of the signals used, although scale models can sometimes be used by testing at shorter wavelengths. The average Goldfinch is 12/13 cm long with a wingspan of 21/25 cm and a weight of 14 to 19 grams. The sexes are broadly similar, with a red face, black and white head, warm brown upperparts, white underparts with buff flanks and breast patches, and black and yellow wings. On closer inspection male Goldfinches can often be distinguished by a larger, darker red mask that extends just behind the eye. In females, the red face does not reach the eye. The ivory-coloured bill is long and pointed, and the tail is forked. Goldfinches in breeding condition have a white bill, with a greyish or blackish mark at the tip for the rest of the year. Juveniles have a plain head and a greyer back but are unmistakable due to the yellow wing stripe. Birds in central Asia (caniceps group) have a plain grey head behind the red face, lacking the black and white head pattern of European and western Asian birds.

Jersey Diners

Peter Genovese

There is nothing more "Jersey" than a diner. Adorning the highways and byways of fully half of the state’s 567 municipalities, no one in New Jersey lives far from one. There are more diners here than in any other state, and on top of that, two of the three remaining diner manufacturers are located in the Garden State. In a year of roadside research, Peter Genovese talked to owners, employees, and customers, and ate more bacon and egg sandwiches than he cares to remember. The result is a funny, revealing book about a beloved American institution. Whether you want to know where and how diners started, who invented eggs served in a skillet, why these twenty-four-hours-a-day eateries are so popular, or, most important, which one has the best French toast, Jersey Diners has the answers.

ANXOVES ESCALA

Caminando por l’Escala nos topamos con esta tienda de Anxoves de l’Escala (marca registrada) y entramos en busca de un delicatessen. Las paredes de la tienda son amarillo chillón, como el propio logo de las anchoas y está repleta de pequeños botes de cristal que contienen tanto anchoas (en sal o limpias) como boquerones. Le preguntamos cuál era la opción más gourmet y nos recomendó un bote de anchoas de Magdalena Sureda, hija del fundador y casualmente en esos momentos la mismísima mujer, de 88 años, entró por la puerta. Le dijimos que estábamos comprando sus anchoas y nos dijo a modo de secreto “són millors les que porten sal”. Las que están bañadas en aceite, pierden su bouqué y los verdaderos gourmands aman limpiarlas de la sal ellos mismos. La mujer era un encanto, después de estar hablando con ella un rato nos dijo que su casa era la nuestra y que vivía en una casa que “ni el rei” (un apartamento en primera línea de mar en su adorada Escala).

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