“I walk over the trails. Rocky, soft, slippery and dangerous. Steep up, then down again. Over and over. Day after day. I don’t feel the danger as I instinctively take the right steps. That’s when I daydream. My attention is focussed on a range of topics but I have my favourites.”
Sketchbooks
In Bangkok, before Geert flew to Katmandu, he was able to purchase these large square sketchbooks in an art supplies store. He bought a few of these, some notebooks, and inks.
Geert used the old ‘face’ of the sketchbooks in a retro design for ‘Black Tea, No Sugar’. Also in a square format but a little larger. The small note book has its pages made of rice paper, and he used it for poems, and deeper reflective notes. Having been in these high mountains temporarily changed him. Geert remembers sitting up in the Annapurna Basecamp and looking at climbing expeditions who were acclimatising and hauling supplies up Annapurna 3. In this magnificent natural circus, he heard avalanches thundering down in the distance and remembered thinking that he was as significant – or insignificant – as a flake of snow.
The photographs in the book are scanned slides from that journey, taken with a modest camera. The quality of these have declined over the years but they are still telling a great story.
Nepal 1989
Trekking in Nepal was a reward – gifted to himself – for graduating his Illustration degree in 1988. He was en-route to his native the Netherlands, after having studied in Australia, and after this hike he was going to start a new life as a professional creative.
Stopping in Nepal, and hiking the Annapurna Circuit and into the Sanctuary, was an experience that he can mostly relive in detail, some 32 years later, as it made a massive impression. Following his lecturer George’s example, he only worked in black & white.
Opa looking from his porch to children playing in the street, with the old bike functioning as the ultimate prop in Katmandu
Porters taking a break whilst their cane baskets are resting against the steep hill on the entrance to the Annapurna Sanctuary. Machapuchare [6,999m] in the background
“There were British and New Zealand climbing expeditions in the Annapurna basecamp at 4000+ metres altitude. After a few Sherpa’s had seen me sketching, they invited me into their camp and I drank a few glasses of beer with them. I got quite merry”
“Back in the days of slides. How about the development of digital photography in these past 32 years! Top slide is in medieval Manang and the bottom slide of an old man, who smoked a cigarette with me at the side of the trail”