Shooting Notes

Arriving to a highly humid tropical town with a variety of equipment proved to be a good idea. Just before leaving I purchased a mirrorless camera with video capabilities and an adjustable recording speed.

Mini dolly with extendable
monopod.

 I was about to get a stabilizer/support, but backed down, thinking I didn't need it. Big mistake. Supports and rails were made for these ultra-light devices because, unlike the traditional video camera which is balanced from front to back, the leveling the horizon while shooting with an SLR-shaped device becomes a challenge.

The 3-axis crane.

So, today, I spent  time looking for a monopod with wheels (AliBaba trading has exactly what I want but will take 12 days--possibly more--to get here). I'll probably kluge something to a shopping cart or a tricycle.

As I considered a stabilizer, I came upon the exquisite Crane-M 3-Axis Handheld Gimbal by Zheyun-Tech (at B&H in New York) which stabilizes action and still cams beautifully but not my camcorder (the pull-out screen doesn't allow perfect balance).

Interesting that professional video equipment is now available for the price I purchased a consumer camera a scant four years ago. The reasoning behind my purchase was that this particular collection of cameras were well adapted to accept XLR input for the sound mic, which is critical for my work. But the pro cams have that, too.

Going forward, I'm seriously considering an upgraded camera; I'll post my research on the advantages. Then again, the motion picture Tangerine was shot on an iPhone 6.

Sticks, Mud and Plaster

To understand why a still-standing hundred-year-old house is a phenomenon, some attention must be given to construction on the north coast of Colombia at the time.

In most of the US, we had much different building techniques due to our need of keeping warm in the winter. Although most places have hot summers, a lot of the US--even the deep South--can and do get snowfalls, even in this age of global warming.

No such thing in this Colombian town. The area I'm drawn to is in the winding delta of the Sinú River, a plain of fertile soil and twice-daily rainfall, once home to the finest indigenous goldsmiths in all of South America.

The homes built around the turn of the 1900s all needed to provide shelter from the sun and rain. Other provisions, but not many, had be made for fungi and moss that grow in the dark, warm, shade. Nothing lasts too long under these conditions, except, a significant element of the population, but I'll write about them another time.

The houses were made by reeds nailed to a hard wood frame. Mud (usually cow manure) was stuffed into the cracks on both sides, and finally, plaster with casein was troweled on. Several coats of oil-based paint sealed the deal, with occasional patch-ups.

The ceilings are high, and the roofs are made from corrugated sheet metal. In some areas, curved brick is put on top of this, but mostly not. Instead, sometimes the roofs are thatched with dried palms.

There are bars on every window and two-level shutters for the afternoon and nighttime. These homes do not have screens, since the insects in the area can easily enter the standard mesh. Instead, people used mosquito nets; I discovered some still cling to that tradition.

One Day a Hundred Years Ago

I had the opportunity to meet with an architect from the mayor's office in Monteria. Dr. Luis Eduardo Puche. He's at the helm of developing an historic quarter for this passed-over city. The project involves an investigation to evaluate, repurpose, rehabilitate where possible, and ultimately preserve the architecture of a a town that blossomed into a city and is bursting at new seams every few years.

As stated in other posts, the town was once a livestock processing center, with cattle health care and evaluation, auctions, bull fights, etc. Roads weren't paved to facilitate the cattle moving from place to place (trucks do that now...) and hey, who needs sewers in that case? When I visited Oklahoma City's Stockyards I saw similarities.

Built around 1900 from mud, piles and plaster, this house is
inhabited by descendants of its owner.

Cattle brings a lot of money; and other land industries sprung up--cotton and sorghum farming. The village was a kluge of shops selling all kinds of wares--purveyors of cowboy products like saddles, feed, twine, barbed wire and the like. Fabrics made from the fine cotton grown nearby went into making clothes and of course, there were food markets.

This kind of living brought about a type of planation living for the wealthy, even though it was edging toward an urban environment. Entertainment, night clubs, and restaurants weren't a large part of the flow of life, since these needs were better served by older, more established cities like Cartagena, Medellin or the capital, Bogota. Instead, entertaining at home was the chief activity, and most participated--even if it was a pre-dinner walk to visit friends in the late afternoon.

Back to Dr. Pucha: He gave me PDFs of the proposals and reports he's put together for the mayor's office of planning and development, which detail the blocks and lots in the oldest part of town. Houses are separated by age, and notes which have been demolished, which suits me perfectly.

I've identified 21 structures that may have been frequented by my subject; and  this web will widen. I plan on visiting them all, early in the morning, since the heat is outrageous. Sunrise at 6:00 and sunset 12 hours later, doesn't make things easier. But the adventure is that I'm never sure what I will find. 

¿Bueno...?

In a total state of disarray, I booked a ticket, filled out the necessary forms to replace an expired passport and got on a plane to the north coast of Colombia. Internet research on the area proved futile, and in full knowledge of how slow life is in a small town in the middle of nowhere (think Oklahoma City with mosquitoes), I rolled into town with the intention of staying a full five weeks to shoot and tape sound.

¡Ay Caramba!

When I got here I was slammed against a thought lurking in the back of my head: Everything in the epicenter of my centenarian subject was, too, going to be around 100 years old. Houses, sidewalks, and friends lingering and lumbering on, mostly withering away.

One hundred-year-old people are surrounded by 100-year-old things.

Yes, it's a part of life, and there is a sweet sadness to be savored. However I didn't understand until I got here that I was walking into a closing book.

One of the houses I was planning to photograph was being evacuated; stacks of fine china and armies of crystal glasses were being packed away, their destiny unknown, the process being done in a different universe from its owners.

I had experienced this several times before. Leaving a place where many years had passed within, what is left behind? With every item packed, discarded, sold or given away, one can't help but look back on an item's significance. The window is poised on a moment etched in time.

Mariana Cook

With less than two weeks to go and facing a mountain of obstacles pathetically mundane, I had to break my silence and begin posting again.

Another project had side-swiped me for a few months, and, while I thought I could shift gears quickly from one to to another, both projects are so intense that I had to shelve one for the moment.

So, in ten days I'm off to South America, where I will chase the life and memories of a centenarian throughout the hills and valleys of northern Colombia, the medical school in Santiago, and maybe the backstreets of Rio de Janeiro and Belo Horizonte. The Brazil trip is a maybe because it's dependent on funds and time.

I will be gone for two months, but everything goes a lot slower in South America, and I might be held back by the technology.

In the meantime, I started amassing images and ideas; Mariana Cook comes to mind. Mariana's work fell under my eyes while I was in my last year of art school, and I've been a silent fan every since. Her portraits are magnificent, but for my purposes, her stony landscapes, so carefully considered, are sleepy storytellers, one boulder on top of the other, as if delicately building a life.

Cairns and stone walls are a staple of human existence; carefully fitting heavy, inorganic objects in the hopes they will never again move betray the intention as time passes, much as memories do.

Yet, memories do move, from different parts of our bodies and minds. They shift in outlook, sometimes needing a reminder or even a resurrection. The connection of one to another, forming a vague synapse--a hand holding--allow them to age together until rustled by another event.

Sensing Motion

A NYT article about a North Carolina professor achieving animal behavior capture through motion sensor got my attention. Scientists have been filming and recording animals in the wild for decades with remote control apparatus, however the motion sensor is a recent development.

As I embark on the new project, I considered the end result, a large projected image, and it's taking shape as an outdoor presentation. Is a motion sensor even needed?

Probably not. Motion sensors get their significance indoors for obvious reasons. Being outdoors necessarily nears something is moving.

Here I bring up the classic structural avant-guarde film, Wavelength. The 45-minute film has little motion, save for a few characters entering and exiting the film briefly in four different instances. Otherwise, it's a slow zoom toward the windows of a Bowery loft in 1967, when that side of town was decidedly raw. Years after the film was made, I was in art school up the block from there. That was the kind of place we students coveted but couldn't afford since its price had blown up a dandelion wisp of the slumming trend so loved in NYC.

The film was made by a Canadian filmmaker Michael Snow. I saw it in graduate school and loved it since, as a still photographer, it gave me the opportunity to observe the details of the film without getting wrapped up in a plot, characters or acting (movies are a difficult medium for me).

As the one beholds the room closing in, the germinating details etch themselves building the stage for the four intrusions of the characters, one of which at a point collapses dead and is discovered by others who had visited the room earlier. The film culminates with the framing of a picture of the wall of a wave in the ocean. Totally great. It's a classic.

Moving while not moving was important in SIS, and is turning into a central issue in FTS. Do memories move or are the memories precisely because they are not moving, frozen in the time space?

Projected Project

As I look to the spring, I'm ready to dive into FINDING THE SKY. A number of personal issues impeded my art-making endeavors but I've decided to turn my back on them and forge forward with my installation.

My last entry was made before the nation was turned upside down by our electing a complete moron to lead us for the next four years. I take responsibility simply because I'm an American. My fellow citizens went to the polls and made sure that the Man in the Chair would get rid of anything non-white; at least push them over the border or to the back burner.

Enough. Four, maybe eight years of who knows what. I'm tired of hearing it/thinking about it.

I was looking at the various light art festivals around the world: Glow in the Netherlands, InLight in Richmond VA, Lux in Helsinki, Festival of Lights in Berlin among many, many others. With the event of light-weight and energy efficient LED units, night festivals with zillions of lights are popping up like mushrooms.

An image from the 2016 Festival of Light in Berlin.
Finding information about this truly engaging
piece is difficult. More information is forthcoming. 

I list the four above because, after carefully combing through a good 20 of them, I sat back and cataloged what I was seeing. All the festivals above include free-standing, flat projected and 3D mapped light sculpture shows--some animated--in which images are perfectly patterned and projected onto huge government buildings. The ones above (and I haven't visited any of them yet) showed works that appear to apprise the environment in which they are in addition to offering consideration for the medium and the message it carries.

The greater majority, sadly, fall short here. The beauty is in the envisioning and innovation of truly spectacular art pieces; they're fully immersive and interactive with the audience but appear (on my computer screen in my warm, cozy apartment) vapid on emotion and correlation.

Sensational work is  to be expected when test-driving new technologies. Exploration is supposed to be a touch naive if it's to be the slightest bit charming. My issue is that most of the pieces lack two critical qualities: an artistic message--why did I do this? what am I saying (or trying to say?) AND why do I need a light sculpture the size of the Sydney Opera House to say it?

In other words, is what's being expressed related--in any way--to light, time, space, color, buildings and architecture, night time, public theatre or is this just another groovy gizmo for the tourists to bring "income to the municipality"?

The most impressive--even if a little over the top--is the 3D animated mapping at Spotlight--Bucharest International Light Festival. The video is five minutes long. 

More on this in the very near future.