Take A Seat Umbria Italy

It is early December, and the oak tree overhanging this shady place is full of late autumn color. In Central Italy, the mild climate means the leaves turn much later than in other parts of the world. In an olive grove, there is an old stone bench, a cool place to sit in the summer that has been there a long time. In front of it is a wooden seat created out of the stump remaining after a tree fell during a winter storm.

Before the mechanisation of olive picking, those seats would have enjoyed the company of olive pickers, all sitting round companionably enjoying a cigarette, a shared bottle of wine (or two) and a quick lunch al fresco.

One of the things that cauht my eye here was the play of light and shadow as the sun shines through the trees, and the almost skeletal branches of the oak tree starting to be seen clearly as their leaves fall.

This is my own photograph, worked on digitally and given an artistic effect.