Manolo Ponte Photography

I met Amina at a wedding of common friends around a year ago. We were sitting on the same table and quickly came to speak about photography and social change, two topics we're both passionate about. I visited her exhibition Grown this Way during Vienna Design Week this year where we talked about taking a little walk around her block together.

So we did, just a few days before Amina moved to Turin in Italy. Before that, she lived in Vienna's 5th district for several years, where we went to find some good locations in the late afternoon. Here's the outcome.

After playing around with some lovely autumn light...

...we found this playground around the corner of Amina's apartment.

What a lovely old couple spending their Sunday on the playground.

On Margaretenstraße, there's some mirrors on the wall outside a hairdresser.

Amina is into Yoga and acrobatics. She sometimes just goes for a spontanous handstand.

I fell in love with this beautiful entrance.

We took some shots in a locked backyard and...

...before the sun finally set, we passed by this construction site.

All shots captured on a Fuji XT-1.
Lenses used: Fuji XF 23mm 2.0, Fuji XF 35mm 2.0, Fuji XF 50mm 2.0.
Show me some love on Insta and leave a comment, if you like.

If you want to go for a walk, just drop me a message.

See you on the Streets!

M

 

 

Stephanie has been my partner in crime for around 9 years now. She's worked a lot with startups in the past, founded the first job fair for refugees in Austria and spent the last two years as a Member of Parliament.

Photographing somebody you know so well is a huge challenge. We agreed to give this walk a theme, as Steph was approaching her last weeks as a member.  This walk was kind of a recap for her, as we visited the places she passed by on her way to work everyday for the last two years. We started out around the corner of our apartment in the ninth district and then moved on to the inner city via Schottentor.

On our way to the first district, Steph had a chocolate cake. Steph loves chocolate cakes.

She loves to dip her cake into her coffee. I tend to look far away when she does so.

Happy post-cake-face.

Two years of memories are connected to this street for Steph.

All shots captured on a Fuji XT-1.
Lenses used: Fuji XF 23mm 2.0, Fuji XF 35mm 2.0, Fuji XF 50mm 2.0.
Show me some love on Insta and leave a comment, if you like.

See you on the Streets!

M

Judith is a model, actress and classical musician. She's a close friend of Simon and we got in contact via Instagram. We met early morning at the Skate Park located in Währinger Park in Vienna's 18th district and moved down to Döblinger Gürtel next to Cafe Blaustern.

I totally fell in love with these green gates that are part of the old Stadtbahnbögen at Döblinger Gürtel for their beautiful patina.

I also love these old factory brick walls and windows.

All shots captured on a Fuji XT-1.
Lenses used: Fuji XF 23mm 2.0, Fuji XF 35mm 2.0, Fuji XF 50mm 2.0.
Show me some love on Insta and leave a comment, if you like.

See you on the Streets!

 

 

Lauren is a singer/songwriter and social entrepreneur from Los Angeles. She is a co-founder of Play with Music, a music program that brings music and technology education to underserved youth. Lauren spent two weeks in Vienna in summer and I took her out for a walk on one of her last days before she went back to the US where we met again at this year's Burning Man. Our walk took us through her interim block in the northern neighbourhoods of Vienna's 9th district - Thurygrund, Althangrund, Himmelpfortgrund and to the close-by Währinger Park. More info on Lauren's work and music: http://laurenturkmusic.com.

We started close to the former university of economy next to Spittelau.

I convinved Lauren to not wear make-up during our shoot to capture her pure nature.

Lauren seems to always carry her Ukulele around.

During her stay, she fell in love with Vienna's Hundertwasser designed waste incineration plant.

We then visited WUK Vienna, one of the loveliest cultural spaces in town.

Our last station led us to Währinger Park.

Lauren prefers to sing in French, her favourite song is La Vie en Rose by Edith Piaf (click for Lauren's Cover).

All shots captured on a Fuji XT-1.
Lenses used: Fuji XF 23mm 2.0, Fuji XF 35mm 2.0, Fuji XF 50mm 2.0.
Show me some love on Insta and leave a comment, if you like.

See you on the Streets!

Well, this was a fun shooting. Lisa's a goldsmith, feminist and dear friend. She just finished her master's in art history. Lisa's an open and very easygoing person and also very photogenic.

We started our walk at Lisa's apartment, which lies at the border between 18th and 19th district. Our walk ended only around 250 meters away from there, when we reached the »Sternwartepark«. The park offered us some beautiful autumn scenery and we also got some nice shots inside the actual planetarium. On our way home, we explored some streets around Lisa's block. We share a love for Wes Anderson weirdo stuff, as you can hopefully feel looking at the pictures. In the end, Lisa and me were quite happy with the outcome.

You don't need to be sober.

Lisa made this ring herself, as far as I know.

And finally, the after-shoot-selfie

See you soon

Equipment: Fuji XT-1, Fuji XF 56 1.2, XF 35 2.0 and XF 14 2.8

This was by far the shortest walk I ever did. My friend Thomas called me on this afternoon in autumn 2018. It was already past four, but we used the chance to get some captures before the sun went down. We had about 25 minutes to shoot with almost no light left. Still, we got a few very nice captures out of this session.

What a great way to spend the afternoon. Even if there wasn't much time, there's always a chance to shoot and you should use it.

Keep on shooting!

M

Equipment: Fuji XT-1, Fuji XF 35mm 2.0, Fuji XF 50 2.0

 

 

 

I got to know Kristin at a concert through my friend Georg. She's a physiotherapist and into analogue photography. She lives in the 17th district, actually just a few houses away from my former apartment. The weather was kinda foggy and cold that day.

I met her early morning at her apartment where she told me that she feels more comfortable behind the camera and that she's not sure if there will be something good coming out of our walk. Well, we gave it a try. See for yourself.

Kristin makes her coffee by hand.

She usually enjoys the calm of the morning on her couch.

Hernals has a lot of beautiful grungy spots that are perfect for portrait sessions.

Kristin somehow reminds me of Denise Richards.

I love these walls. They're just next to the church on Kalvarienberg.

Kristin has a star tattoo on her hand.

You may know these walls, too. If I remember right, they're on the side of the district authority close to Elterleinplatz.

When walking around the streets, I always try to find these entrances...

...and open doors that lead to hidden backyards like this one. Actually it started to rain only two minutes after we finished shooting. We even forgot about the aftershoot-selfie. But there's gonna be a chance to repeat that for sure.

Let me know what you think about the outcome in the comments.

Stay inspired.

M

Equipment: Fuji XT-1, Fuji XF-35 2.0, Fuji XF-56 1.2

This one, I was looking forward to for quite a while. Georg is one of my closest friends, but it's hard to get him in front of the camera. Georg is a content creator and curator. He works for an Austrian TV station and writes for several film related blogs, among them the NY based Short of the Week. Georg has also been a part of my team at DREAMA TV.

He lives in the 6th district, close to Westbahnhof and Mariahilferstraße. We met at 7:30 and didn't have too much time, as we both needed to work after the shoot. So we decided to walk down to Mollardgasse and look for some nice spots. Here's the result.

As I may mentioned before, I dig these grungy backyards that you find around town if you walk with open eyes.

Georg is into american sports, especially baseball and football. May explain this pose.

Georg is a very funny guy. Though he looks quite serious most of the times.

 

Back on Mollardgasse.

Totally love this one.

In the end, we found this beautiful backyard next to a school.

Georg is working on new projects right now. Watch out!

This walk was great fun and gave us the chance for a very deep conversation, which I sometimes struggle to find time for nowadays.

Stay Inspired and let me know what you think about this session in the comments.

M

Equipment: Fuji XT-1, Fuji XF-23 2.0, Fuji XF-35 2.0, Fuji XF-56 1.2