Devils and Perchs

In Austria there is a tradition that shortly after christmas till the first days of January Perchs should evict the winter. Originally, the word Perchten (plural of Perchta) referred to the female masks representing the entourage of an ancient goddess, Frau Perchta, or Pehta Baba as it is known in Slovenia. I visited a "Perchenlauf" (perchs parade) in late December 2016, where I took several pictures of this event. I had a pretty difficult time photographing because the ligt situation in such an event always changes, there is a lot of light from the torches, there is a lot of darkness because of the night and there is often a lot of fast movement from the perchs.

The shutterspeed has to be fast enough to not blur out the image with movements and at the same time needs to provide enough light for the picture in the dark. Not really the easiest combination. Still objects like in the first picture are probably the easiest in this situation.

Mask of a Perch. Picture: Florian Glechner.

Perch with torches. Picture: Florian Glechner.

A lot of different masks. Picture: Florian Glechner.

Fester movement difficult to photograph in this light situation. Picture: Florian Glechner.

"Beatutiful" Masks and masquerade. Picture: Florian Glechner.