Sunday, April 18, 2004

regularity

caveat: some pictures are ~200 KB.

In Jill's blog, a concept-driven photo series was reported. I was Not Impressed, or did not like the results (can't honestly say now which occured first), although the general thrust of intersecting a usual view with a time-grid did have some merits -- the main outcome being a partial suppression of the "artist's" own opinion at each moment, in favour presumably of their sensibility over time. The GPS-based Degree Confluence Project is superficially similar, though I find that ludricous (yeah right, whose grid?).

There's some better examples reported in the subsequent commentage. But hang on, I must have liked the idea once: didn't I try a 12-hour series a couple of years ago. And am I not doing a pond, right now?

Here's "my" pond again, roughly a fortnight ago, reached on the day using a wonderful mode of transport. The obvious, if not to say hackneyed, idea behind this growing pond series is (algorithmically, but without being overly disciplined) to continue recording the same scene, observant of any changes: in the landscape; the picture-taker; the viewer; anything else. The real objective is of course to reveal non-obvious ideas.

Possible N-O.I. # 1: an algorhythm.

More on this later. Suffice to say that since I'm too busy/lazy/disorganised to always turn up at a particular time, the idea of a strict metronomic schedule is unavailable to me. I go there whenever I can -- the site is a healthy walk from one of my workplaces -- and grab a shot. One or two a week would be fine.

The real rhythm outdoors is different, anyway. Absolute, yet infinitely flexible: Spring is later [1,2] on this slightly exposed plateau, than elsewhere in the country, where daff's are long gone; Moscow is still waiting for spring, so I hear.

Possible N-O.I. # 2: the human gnomon.

Notice the light and the quality of the ground in this scene. It being mid-ish-day, the sun is higher and the sandy ground drier than of late. Compare to another, months earlier. Good ol' Jill's got one like it but she's way up north: yet another variable!

and she sticks her hips out more ;)


Possible Supplementary: could a worldwide group connect, through their photos, an arc (in space and time) of specific equivalent solar moments? Let's imagine us all waiting for rays at 45 degrees (casting shadows of the person's exact height on the ground). My 10 o'clock in London to your 7 am in Barcelona to another's Noon in Stockholm? Here's another human-gnomon from those degree-chasing boys (they will be boys, I trust).

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