citysphere urban envi ronment photography

special edition: valparaiso: world heritage centre

issue nº 3

Welcome everyone to this special issue

of Citysphere, the photo-magazine dedi-

cated to the urban environment.

This time I have decided to feature the

Chilean city-harbor of Valparaiso, a

World Heritage Centre.

It is not easy to describe this city, precari-

ously built between the Pacific Ocean and

impossibly steep hills. In a way this city

defies any type description so it lends it-

self beautifully to be photographed.

Valparaiso is, no doubt, a special place

and possesses a personality lacking in

most cities in Chile. The architecture is a

wonderful mix of styles, with obvious

European, especially British, influences,

but then this would be expected from a

city so tightly entwined with the sea.

However, Valparaíso offers much more

than just interesting architecture; it fea-

tures complex narrow streets that seem to

follow no specific design, century old

lifts that defy gravity and transport people

to their homes away from the sea and up

the hills. Churches and old weather-

beaten houses desperately clinging to the

hillsides; there are cafes, art centres, res-

taurants and hundreds of places waiting to

be discovered.

I’ve got nothing else to say, whatever

else I write about this place is likely to

sound cliché, so I just hope the following

images can do some justice to this power-

ful urban wonder.

Marcelo Rabanal, November 2009.

Citysphere issue 3

All photographs, design and text by Marcelo Rabanal, 2009

mrabanal@hotmail.com

http://www.flickr.com/photos/marcelor

http://mr.f-sur.com/wordpress/index.php

http://mrabanal.deviantart.com