[Leica] IMG: Belgian markets

[Nathan Wajsman]

Something from my film archives:

Back when I lived in Brussels, from 1995 to 2000, part of our Sunday ritual was to visit one of the many “brocantes”. A brocante is an antiques market, with the stuff on offer ranging from genuine antiques to pure flea market junk, and everything in-between. They are held in many parts of Brussels and in other towns. The best and biggest is in a town called Tongeren/Tongres, about 85 km from Brussels near the Dutch border. Every Sunday, the streets of a medieval town are closed to traffic and turn into a huge market with buyers and sellers from the local area and from neighbouring parts of the Netherlands and Germany. We still have pieces of furniture that we bought there more than 20 years ago.

But on most Sundays we did not feel like the long drive, so we just went to one of the smaller neighbourhood markets, like the one in Waterloo, a suburb south Brussels where Napoleon lost his final battle in 1815. The market there was held in a large parking lot of a supermarket, so not exactly grand surroundings, but it was fun to walk around and photograph the buyers, the sellers and the merchandise on offer.

I have collected about 20 pictures from February and March 1999 that I readily found in my Lightroom film archive. I may add to the gallery if I find more. I do not get to visit these markets these days since I am rarely in Brussels on a Sunday—my trips there are business trips, so they take place during the working week.

All the images are genuine Leica stuff, shot mostly with an M6 and 35mm or 50mm lenses (including at least some with a Noctilux which I had at the time). I used mostly Ilford films at the time.

So have a look at a slice of life in Belgium 21 years ago:

https://www.greatpix.eu/Belgian-brocantes/ <https://www.greatpix.eu/Belgian-brocantes/>

Cheers,
Nathan

Nathan Wajsman

Alicante, Spain
http://www.frozenlight.eu <http://www.frozenlight.eu/>
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YNWA

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