Tag: Photography

Fragile strengths

I regularly write in response to something; be it a song, a paragraph in a book or any other text.

Last Sunday, a priest from Ukraine sent me his sermon to listen to via WhatsApp. I had an immediate response to his work and I wrote this almost immediately after listening to his words.

I thought it is worth sharing it with you and I would be thrilled if you could write your feedback on this piece both in terms of your emotional response as well as my writing craft.

Were you also inspired by sermons in your childhood? It is a huge step into psychological integration when we absorb the wisdoms of our religions, I think.

Here’s the text:

I assume today that you need to hear that you are capable of mature reflection, that it’s good to long for reason and normality, that it’s good to give yourself a little oxygen.

I assume today that you haven’t sinned.

That you came here today to free yourself for a moment from the burdens of the day.

Welcome then. I’m glad you came, I’m glad to see you.

Don’t lose yourself in guilt. Understand the weight of your decisions, but don’t lose yourself in guilt.

I assume today that you have not sinned.

Let the pain in your limbs fade. You are here. I appreciate you.

Do not lose yourself in guilt.

That’s it. I hope this helps. x

Text and photography: Alicja Pyszka-Franceschini, 2026. All rights reserved.

An image that helps me breathe

It might be a bit counter-intuitive to share a photo of a frosty landscape here in the middle of Spring in the northern hemisphere, but I have been wanting to write about it for a while now primarily because it is in my opinion one of the images that allows the viewers to breathe. I took it near Repton, in South Derbyshire on a frosty morning during a week when the local river flooded and the fields were glistening with water reflections. The bended trees are interesting features of the landscape and it appeals to me how they are strongly supported by the ground and its unshakable structure. My support towards these kind of images come from the fact that they repeat the relief experience whenever one looks at the image and associate it with a welcome break. Being brought up in Poland, I find frost refreshing and altering and seeing this image again and again helps me refresh and also regain alertness. Is it the same for you?

Image and text: Alicja Pyszka-Franceschini

Do you have any photographs in your surroundings that do the same to you? That help you breathe?

Unreal

We’ve been living a strange life recently.  

That of escapism to some extent. 

Where everything is real but in fact unreal for me. 

The online world is amazing but only as far as it actually sees you. But it rarely does. It sees the outputs of our work, perhaps, our ingenuities, but it doesn’t look one in the eye or take our child from our hands when the arms are exhausted from holding them.  I have been a bit grumpy lately, as you probably sense from this post, I feel that to some extent I embody my own grandmother who at times would talk to herself while going to the cellar to fetch some jars and would complain about the state of the world or about all the wrong decisions that according to her one of us had taken.  She would complain about the jars too, that they stand too high and she cannot reach them. Or that we move too quickly or eat too quickly and she cannot keep up.  She wanted to keep up but she couldn’t.  I cannot keep up either. I wonder what she complains about nowadays? Wherever she is now. Maybe she doesn’t complain at all. Maybe up there she rides a bike.  :)

I wonder though at times what would enable us to keep up, or perhaps it is really insane at times to demand from people that they would be enabled. Feels wrong at times, doesn’t it?

Or are we just resisting change?

They

When angels sing, they love better.

Photo and Thought: Alicja Pyszka-Franceschini

Colour combinations

It’s been around Easter when we played around with my daughter with painting plates, melting bee’s wax and dropping shadows on different textures. We enjoyed it all and making different arrangements with different colour combinations. It was a playful and joyful time together.

I feel my internal batteries are a bit discharged today as the week days were long and intense but I hope you will find the photographs energizing and inspiring. Can you spot a bunny in the last photo?

Till next time.

Have a nice weekend!

Alicja

Photos and text: Alicja Pyszka-Franceschini