Born in Jerusalem and now based in Sydney, Jude Cohen is a travel and lifestyle photographer known for capturing the
emotional truth behind place. Over the past decade, his lens has wandered from the Muay Thai rings of Thailand to the turquoise coves of Capri and the alleyways of Jerusalem, documenting how people, light and culture shape one another.
Jude has just released his debut book, 10 Years of Photography, bringing together a decade of images and essays. Here, he writes about Positano in Italy for The Carousel.
Positano: The Amalfi Coast
This was not my first time in Positano. A few years earlier, me and the boys had come for a long lunch at the legendary beachside spot Da Adolfo. We had secured a booking through a friend of a friend who knew the owner’s son, also named Adolfo. When we turned up sunburnt, half hungover and hopeless, we found out the booking was actually for the day before. Typical.
So instead, we sat next door for hours, nursing Aperol spritzes and watching the organised chaos unfold: barefoot waiters weaving through crowds, boats pulling up and peeling away, seafood sizzling over open flames. Even exhausted, there was something strangely restorative about the salt air and the pace of the place.
Fast forward a few years, after a pandemic and too much time spent in Australia, I found myself back on the Amalfi Coast. Capri was my first stop, where a brief romance with a girl I had met in Tel Aviv ended in predictable disaster. Sometimes being a spontaneous romantic backfires on you.
When it came time to leave Capri, I hesitated. I remembered Positano as beautiful but chaotic, and I was not sure I had the energy for that version of it. Then I thought of Adolfo Junior.
On a whim, I called him. After a quick chat, he invited me to stay at his family home in the hills of Positano. I was reluctant, because I barely knew him and Positanese locals have a reputation for being particular. But something in me said yes.
The boat ride from Capri to Positano was pure Amalfi theatre. Rugged cliffs fell straight into turquoise water, pastel buildings stacked themselves on the hillsides, and the coastline shimmered like it knew exactly who it was. It was impossible not to breathe deeper.
Adolfo’s villa sat high in the hills with views over the beach. I had been in Europe for three months at this point, eating everything, drinking everything, smoking a pack a day and avoiding any gym within sight. The climb up to the villa was brutal. The kind of steep, winding steps that make you question every decision you have ever made. No one tells you that Positano is a vertical maze unless you want to pay fifty euros for a cab every time.
By the time I reached the top, drenched and swearing, Adolfo greeted me with his friend Mitch and a bottle of wine. The villa was stunning. Old Italian tiles, sun soaked terraces, little corners made for slow afternoons. Within an hour, wine open and stories flowing, I knew I had made the right call.
The next few days settled into the kind of rhythm Italy does best. Long lunches that stretched into late afternoons. Dinners that drifted into the night. Endless wine. We ate our way through Positano but always circled back to Da Adolfo. The place does not have a phone number. You either know someone or you do not. And if you are lucky enough to get in, you might find yourself eating grilled mozzarella on lemon leaves next to a Hollywood actor or a Russian oligarch.
But beneath the charm and the chaos, something in me was slowing down. The pace of the town was unhurried and self assured. The more time I spent there, the more I felt myself shifting with it.
Somewhere between the Italian sun, the Aperol spritz and the rich and famous, I realised travel isn’t about seeing as much as possible, but feeling as much as possible.
On my last day, I brought my camera to Da Adolfo. Sergio, the owner, famously charismatic and famously tough, gave me a nod and let me shoot. I photographed the restaurant, the staff, the movement, the sunlight bouncing off the water. It felt like I was capturing not just a place, but a small truth about Southern Italy.
It felt, in some small way, like I was documenting a piece of history, a world that only really exists in dreams and in southern Italy.
Leaving Positano, I realised the town had done what it always does. It had forced me to slow down, breathe deeper and pay attention to the small, cinematic moments that make life feel like it belongs to you again.
Jude Cohen is a Sydney based photographer whose debut monograph, “Jude Cohen:10 Years of Photography”, captures a decade of travel, intimacy and observation across more than thirty countries. The book is available now through Cohen Media House, RRP $220.
