Imaging Brazil 354: Palm Tree Reflection, BELO HORIZONTE (MG)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

354: Palm tree reflection

When I lived in Belo Horizonte, I often spent my Sundays in the center of the enormous city. On pleasant, sunny days I walked through the Avenida Afonso Pena, all the way to the end at Praça da Bandeira: a distance of about six kilometers. There I continued my walking tour via a climbing street to the entrance of city park Mangabeiras. After this effort – some friends told me that I was nuts to walk this long distance – I often went to the stand where refreshing açai was sold. After having consumed this delicious energy bomb, I started my exploration through the park. With my camera in hand I searched for interesting compositions, as I saw this water reflection of small palm trees in a pond.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2012, 2017

Imaging Brazil 354: Palm Tree Reflection in Belo Horizonte, MG (2012)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

354: Palm tree reflection

When I lived in Belo Horizonte, I often spent my Sundays in the center of the enormous city. On pleasant, sunny days I walked through the Avenida Afonso Pena, all the way to the end at Praça da Bandeira: a distance of about six kilometers. There I continued my walking tour via a climbing street to the entrance of city park Mangabeiras. After this effort – some friends told me that I was nuts to walk this long distance – I often went to the stand where refreshing açai was sold. After having consumed this delicious energy bomb, I started my exploration through the park. With my camera in hand I searched for interesting compositions, as I saw this water reflection of small palm trees in a pond.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2012, 2017

Imaging Brazil 351: Colored Panels in Brumadinho, MG (2012)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

351: Colored panels

At a distance of about 60 km from Belo Horizonte, within the limits of the municipality of Brumadinho, is an interesting botanical garden as well as a contemporary art museum: Inhotim. Inhotim was created by former mining magnate Bernardo Vaz, who sold his impressive art collection and acquired a large area around his farm. At present, the area is more then twenty square kilometers. Only a small part of this vast area is publicly accessible, and contains a number of art works and art galleries that are integrated in the botanical garden, which contains more than 1500 palm tree species, the largest in the world. One of the principal art pieces consists of nine large colored panels, in a vertical position. This art piece by Hélio Oiticia (1937-1980) is called “Magic Square No. 5” (Invenção da cor, Penetrável Magic Square # 5, De Luxe , 1977). They symbolize buildings in open air, with which the visitor can feel, touch, inspire, and visualize within this labyrinth square.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2012, 2017

Imaging Brazil 349: Bridge in Japanese Garden in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

349: Japanese Garden

The Zoo in Belo Horizonte is located in the Pampulha District, at Lake Pampulha. The Zoo (Zoológico in Portuguese) was founded in 1959 and also hosts a large Botanical Garden (Jardim Botánico), which was opened for public in 2001. In 2008, when the Centenary of the Japanese Migration to Brazil was widely celebrated, the Japanese Garden was inaugurated. The Garden was an initiative of the Japanese Consul in Belo Horizonte (Rinaldo Campos Soares), the City of Belo Horizonte, and a Japanese-Brazilian cultural organization (Associação Mineira de Cultura Nipo-Brasileira). Landscape architect Haruho Ieda was responsible for the project, which was inspired upon traditional Japanese gardens: a pond with multi-colored koi fish, several Japanese trees (cherry tree, pine tree, bamboo), artificial waterfalls, a traditional tea house, Japanese lanterns and a typical Japanese bridge.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 346: White Calla Lily with Yellow Stamen in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

346: White calla lily

This beautiful, creamy white calla lily was found in Parque Municipal in Belo Horizonte. These lilies are originally from Southern Africa, and are very popular among florists. They are strong plants with arrow-shaped leaves and a trumpet-shaped flower. By far the most well-known are the creamy white flowers, but there are also orange, green, yellow, pink, purple, light blue and dark red variants. The creamy white flowers are often associated with wedding bouquets and religious celebrations, symbolizing purity, rebirth and hope.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 343: Red and Yellow Heliconia Plant in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

343: Heliconia plant

Heliconia plants are quite common in Brazil, especially in ornamental gardens and urban parks. This is how I met this heliconia plant at the Parque Municipal (urban park) in Belo Horizonte. The plant is family of the banana, and is named after the Helicon mountain (where the muses lived) in Greek mythology. The large, yellow and red, hanging bracts hide the flowers, which are very popular among the hummingbirds. Because of the difficult accessibility of the flowers, the plant is very dependent on these hummingbirds for the pollination. The plant also stores water and is loved in this way by a number of insects, including mosquitoes. As the Helicon mountain offered much inspiration to poets, this colorful heliconia plant offered me inspiration for this photo.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 333: Maria-Boba Butterfly in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

333: Butterfly and blue flowers

I found this butterfly in the butterfly garden of Parque Municipal in Belo Horizonte. Using Google, it was fairly easy to find out that this butterfly is called a maria-boba (‘Crazy Mary’). The scientific name is Heliconius ethilla narcaea, described by Godart in Rio de Janeiro in 1819. This butterfly species is quite common, from Panama to the extreme south of Brazil. It flies quite slowly, but it doesn’t need to be really afraid of hunters: they are poisonous for their predators. You will find this flutter mainly in the passionflower bushes, but other colorful (mainly red) flowers also attract its attention, including the blue flowers in the photo.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 329: Shoal of Fish in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

329: Shoal of fish

In weekends, I used to wander around in the center of Belo Horizonte, and paid a visit to one of the municipal parks. The nearest municipal park is Parque Municipal Américo Renné Giannetti, which is located at the Afonso Pena Avenue. My favorite locations in this park were the Butterfly Garden, where you could meet a collection of colorful flowers that attracted some dozens of butterflies of various sizes, shapes and colors. Another favorite spot of mine was the pond that hosts certain water bird species and some fish species. When you take a closer look in the water, you can observe the big, colorful koi carps. Smaller, and less colorful fish are seen on the photograph. A large shoal of greyish-brown fish of different sizes and age. The younger fish have big heads and big eyes. They must be searching desperately for oxygen or for some food.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 320: Pink Flowers in Parque Municipal in Belo Horizonte, MG (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

320: Pink flowers

During the weekends, I was regularly found in the center of Belo Horizonte. Sometimes I visited the versatile Mercado Central on Saturday, or the cozy open air market Feira Hippie on Sunday morning, followed by a visit to Parque Municipal, the city park. A butterfly park was recently opened there, and various types of butterflies actually came across the colorful and fragrant flowers. Even in the absence of butterflies, it was very pleasant to wander around in the colored beds of various flowers. With my camera in hand. As a result, this beautiful flower with an intense pink color was pictured.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017

Imaging Brazil 313: Cactus Plants at Morro da Pescaria in Guarapari, ES (2011)

A personal selection of photographs with their stories.

313: Cactus plants at Morro da Pescaria

Guarapari is a popular beach resort in the state of Espirito Santo, at a distance of about fifty kilometers south of the capital Vitória. Especially among the mineiros (inhabitants of the neighboring state of Minas Gerais) Guarapari is very populair. Guarapari boasts some beautiful beaches, of which Praia dos Namorados and Praia do Morro are the most famous. Not far from Praia do Morro is a natural park, which is currently managed by the municipality. For a small fee, the visitor can follow a path of little more than one kilometer to a beach surrounded by natural vegetation, Praia do Ermitão. From this beach it is even possible to swim to Ilha da Raposa (‘Fox Island’). The park hosts original Atlantic Forest type and the so-called restinga type vegetations. The cactus plants on the photograph were located on one of the rocky slopes.

© Adriano Antoine Robbesom 2011, 2017