Archive: 2-24-09

5-4-09: Humanless Encounters;

5-3-09: Haiku/Oulipo

I should not have been willing to further procrastinate by pondering films. But I was watching Wendy & Lucy and Old Joy, hearing the soundtrack, listening, pouring over the images. Both films were comfortable, like hearing stories from old friends: profound, pliable, and porous. These were movies of outside lives; rapport was quickly gained through each narrative. Despite my enjoyment of the films, I had to get busy: I was surrounded by to do lists and potential video subjects. I began to drink caffeine to get myself wound up, or I was liable to fall asleep, another all-nighter, poor me.

***

The video today was to be a haiku. I followed the syllable prescription for the poetic form by interpreting each shot as a syllable. The black screen serves as a separation between lines.

The writing obstruction was to include the letter combinations ou, li, po in that order, but not necessarily consecutively, in each sentence. This is a tribute to Oulipo, a group of mainly French writers who use constraints to focus their writing. This project was partially inspired by this group.

5-2-09: One Take, Masked; All Nouns

Peter work, convenience store, laptop, homework. Car? Madison, Mifflin. Peter phone, voice. Lens, Tool Box, Duct tape: Car. Car? Madison. Peter? Madison. Desk, camera, tape measure? Kenilworth. Bus? Tim, bus. Kenilworth. Hallways, echoes, darkness. Homework, Coffee, Shadows. Art: Desk, Projector, glass, books, lens. Lens? Car, Madison, Peter. Bus, Home, Bed. Sleep? Coffee. Ceiling: hole, paper, duct tape. Hole: head? Fist? Foot? Room, sweat, blankets. Window. Porch, air, breath. Skyline, sunrise. Yawn. Coffee? Toilet. Sleep? Sunrise. Homework, papers, movies, installation. Time, computer, Facebook, email, Myspace, Youtube. Homework? Facebook. Journal, pen, thoughts, poems. Books, Leonard Cohen. Headphones. iPod, solitare, bed, podcasts. Sleep.

1 May 2009: Orange, not blue, or yellow unless; Airiness

I must have been daydreaming (in spite of the hour); I wasn’t sure how long I had been at my doorstep, keys in hand. I did remember getting off the bus, or did I just assume that. I leave work, I get on the bus, I get off the bus, I walk home: Right? There was a density to my shift at work, having not slept. I would have to make a pot of coffee. Maybe I walked all the way from work. But, probably not. There weren’t any stars that night: it must have been cloudy.

30 April: 10 shots, 3 seconds each; Single words or Shopping List

Reese’s Hershey’s Pepsi-cola Yoo-Hoo Power Bar 7-Up Sunkist G2 Ritz Bitz Oscar Meyer Ne-Mo Muscle Milk Tootsie Pops Lunchables Life-Savers Maxipad Wrigley’s Trojan Bic Dots Carmex Jack Links Mrs. Fields Uncle Ray’s Andy Capp’s Oreo Orbit TGIFriday’s Caramelo Rolo Whachamacallit Mountain Dew Laffty Taffy Milky Way Junior Mints Bubble Yum Nyquil Tresseme’ Zantac VO5 Sierra Mist Snapple Starbucks Crazy Glue Campbell’s Dinty Moore Progresso Betty Crocker Maruchan Dr. Pepper RedBull Monster Charmin Clorox No Fear SoBe Lifewater Orbit Eclipse Solo Chaquita Bicycle Air-Heads Fiji Hy-Drive Live Wire Voltage Code Red Supernova Combos Cheese-its Cakesters Cheese Nips Keebler Qauker Chips Ahoy

***

I used today's parameter to gather my favorite types of images, lines. This video was shot in spaces on campus at night that I could spend hours in. The inclusion of my voice tonight is perhaps a homage to experimental filmmaker, Brian Gallagher, whose work I've been immersed in for the past few weeks.

For the writing, I could only use single words, a shopping list, perhaps. And, well, this is only 100 words of an eight hour shift at a convenience store. Yes, some of the brands are two words, but in some cases it is the name of the family brand and then a specific product (some of these are separated), but the rest are the trademarked name of the brand or product and I viewed as inseparable, a single word.

Post Script
I apologize for falling behind. I will get the other video/texts edited and posted tomorrow and be back on top of everything come Monday. I appreciate your patience.

29 April 2009: American Indian; Where

Where are the trees near enough to Kenilworth to have dropped the stick on the glass awning? A student hanging around like a dropped penny may have lobbed it up. Where the trees grow may be close enough for the wind to have blown the stick to its resting place. However, the stick is of a fair size and would have required a robust breeze. Where the stick originally landed is marked by a shadow of dirt and minerals. The wind is capable of moving the stick, at least a few inches. Where from and how far? It was likely thrown.

***

The video today had to incorporate "Something Native American," at a loss, I used a location that I was at anyway for grocery shopping near some paths down to the MKE river. I had a water bottle on me. The water leads out of the urban environment into a green space as a representation of the Trail of Tears.

28 April 2009: The Color Blue; 3rd Person

Kathy Sennott wrote her name on the title page of a copy of Great Jones Street, her printing was a rectangle that would prove a T-square to be at 89 degrees. The writer didn’t notice this when he first flipped through it. He did notice, though, that a previous owner had been in conversation with the copy by underlining, bracketing, and making notations on portions of the text. Thorough at first, or enthusiastic at least, the highlighting of passages and phrases slowly waned up to page 100 but picked up around 180 and remained frequent through the final 40 pages.

27 April 2009: Pointed Upward; sdrawkcaB

“’.tis I ereH’ ?gniyas eht wonk uoY” ,namow gnitiaw a ot dias moorhtab eht detixe enac sih dniheb gniklaw nam A .dekool I .em dniheb htaerb delahxe na saw erehT .ti depparwnu ,regrub dnoces eht pu dekcip I setunim wef a retfA .elttes ot nageb doof ehT .elbat eht no detnalp swoble dna tsif a ni rehtegot depsalc,sdnah ym no nihc ym detser I .notrac yrf eht otni ti depleh dna repparw tsrif eht dlepmurc I .esaerg gnideelb ,renil repap eht pota tas seirf denahpro wef a dna ,depparw llits ,sregrub eht fo enO .ytpme sdriht-owt saw yart ehT

***

The video today had to be shot with the camera pointing up. The second shot is less extreme in its upward tilt, but the ground has a definite slope up, away from the camera, that is not easily perceived in the macro shot.

A mirror may come in handy for today's text. Start reading from the bottom. The obstruction was courtesy W.M., and proved rather frustrating. The image is taken from a meal at a franchise of everyone's favorite fast-food mega-chain.

26 April 2009: Quiet & Still; Multiple Haiku

Growing through plastic
woven in chain link fence a
tree reaches for you

Leaves have not returned
Branches clamor atop each
other waiting for

sunlight and summer
to loose the knots of winter
tied in wet black boughs

Fingers touch your cheek
Roots nudge against the sidewalk
The fence scowls in grey

metal and plastic
strips the bark Green flesh is bare
washed clean in the rain

A split-end like hair
cradles rain droplet with light
A lens A rainbow

Plastic is broken
Arms wrestle the metal fence
trunk has grown around

the chain New born buds
leaves in waiting look at you
say Do not pass by

***

Both of today's obstructions were contributed by classmates, as were many of the other obstructions that may be drawn during the next few weeks.

The video was to be shot of the "most quiet and still place you encounter today." That place is a roundabout near my apartment. In a residential intersection a block from a busy commercial area, the roundabout seems to me a sanctuary, an island, that no-one enters. Amid the traffic, commerce, and life that surrounds, the roundabout is a mechanism for the smooth flow of a day that sits in meditation.

The text was dictated to be "made entirely of haikus [sic]." I interpreted this to mean that it should be a piece made of a series of traditionally metered haiku linked together. In walking past a neighboring yard, I noticed for the first time a small tree that was planted in the yard that had grown through the chain link fence with white plastic strips woven into the fence for privacy.