I adore excellence in photography, and my breath was taken away by the amazing photographs taken of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano which is currently causing so much havoc in Iceland and Western Europe.

I have long observed that Iceland has a ridiculously high concentration of excellent photographers. This might have been because the (formerly) rich population of this small island nation had nothing else to do with all their krónur than drink and practice hobbies.

But that is only part of the story. With natural beauty such as this, who wouldn’t want to take up photography!?

Lightning and motion-blurred ash captured in a 15-second exposure. Taken at a distance 25 km from the Eyjafjallajokull craters on April 18th, 2010. (© Olivier Vandeginste)