more about the festival…

Roos delivering books to Governors Island in NYC

These pictures were taken – before neither of us knew what would become of them - by Theo Westenberger whom I met through a mutual friend. One night in the summer of 2003 we all met for drinks uptown before going downtown to an art opening. They went by taxi and I went on my blue Panasonic bike. It was a hot New York night and I was wearing a dress and cowboy boots. I remember flying down, feeling extremely alive, focused and free. The warm air blowing on my skin while the city was roaring like a wild beast (Yes, biking in New York can be quite sexy).

Anyways, I beat them. And Theo was so impressed with my style that she asked me if I wanted to do a photo shoot for Travel & Leisure Magazine as they had an issue about city traveling. I agreed and we spent a crisp morning in fall together, me in my dress and cowboy boots, biking up and down the Brooklyn Bridge!

This was six years ago. Before bicycling was ‘in’ as a lifestyle and before I had any idea about ever making a book about it. The photos never got published because Theo got sick and I went back to Amsterdam. I had never even seen them until recently when I got the negatives from Theo’s assistant Molly Surno.

Theo died last year. She never knew how her pictured story would continue. Or maybe she did.
At least I didn’t know. In 2003 I was busy studying Art Therapy at New York University on a Fulbright scholarship, having just completed my MA in Psychology in Amsterdam. In fact, if I think of it, most things I have done in my life I have done unaware of the fact that I would make a book about bicycling in New York. But I guess they all add up, and this I always believed.