AMP

Back from MacDowell, missing the time & space I had already. Here’s one last install shot of some new work. Will hopefully have this new work on the website soon.

Hard at work here at Camp MacDowell. When I haven’t been making huge blueprints I’ve been creating some experimental projection pieces in which videos are projected onto photographs. The photographs they are projected onto are created by projecting the video onto light-sensitive paper (read: long exposure). There is a certain kind of beauty in both the redundancy of the image/video and the temporal confusion by layering ongoing moments on top of still images. Watch examples below:

Quad folder opens like a Transformer!

“this light is like snowflakes!”

eating my prints

It’s so easy to be productive here…

Walked around with the strobe last night–I can’t see anything w/o it.

My studio in Brooklyn was approximately 90 square feet if you counted the ‘hallway’ path that people used to get to the bathroom. It was also humid as hell, had no natural light, and cost $300/month. My studio at MacDowell is an improvement in every imaginable way, save for the less-than-convenient location of being 240 miles away from Brooklyn. I guess that’s why there’s a bed in it. Peep the 360˚ view below:

Also, I seem to have lost all concept of time up here–what is a Friday?

I’m up at the MacDowell colony for the month of July–stay tuned for works-in-progress and nature reports. I’ve only been up here for one day and I already feel like the luckiest guy in the world.

I’ve been completely obsessed with the Earth’s moon lately. Besides being the only major counterpart to our Sun in the sky (which I’ve pondered for quite some time), I’ve recently been turned on to it’s thrilling history, inspiration, and potential.

This probably all started when my musical companion Ryan and I wrote a song for a concept album about the chaos of peak oil destroying the planet and being forced to colonize the moon, appropriately titled ‘To The Moon‘. It was my first attempt at playing the drums, and nicely mimics the Apollo 13 mission to the moon which was dubbed a ’successful failure’. Still, it’s a fun jam to play–the last time I played it was at a backyard birthday party in which I jumped in the pool upon finishing the song. Forgot to take my phone out of my pocket. Whoops.

Spread from James Nasmyth's 'The Moon Considered As A Planet...'

After replacing my phone I came across a fantastic little reprint of ‘The Moon: Considered As A Planet, A World And A Satellite’. This book was originally published in 1885 and became known for it’s intriguing illustrations of the moon, which are actually photographs of large and highly-detailed models created from many illustrations based on telescopic observation. The results are otherworldly–I would love to see an original copy with the pigment prints if anybody has one. The text is a basic scientific discussion of how the surface of the moon came to be. I’ll be honest and tell you that I haven’t read much of it and usually just look at the pictures.

Michael Collins' book 'Flying to the Moon'

Not too long ago I was given a copy of Michael Collins’ book ‘Flying To The Moon‘, which is an account of Collins’ training as an astronaut and his experience aboard the Gemini 10 and Apollo 11 flights (he’s known for being the unsung third astronaut to accompany Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong to the moon). The book is aimed at younger readers, but I still found plenty to love. I specifically love Collins’ account of orbiting the far side of the moon, completely cut off from all communication and ties to the rest of the world:

“I suppose one reason I didn’t feel lonely was that I had been flying airplanes by myself for nearly twenty years. This time, however, I had to admit that it was a bit different, especially on the far side of the moon. There, cut off from all communication, I was truly alone, the only person in the solar system who could not even see the planet of his birth. Far from causing fear, this situation gave me a good feeling–one of confidence and satisfaction. Outside my windows I could see stars, and nothing else. I knew where the moon was, but in total darkness, it’s surface was not visible: it was simply that part of my window which had no stars in it. The feeling was less like flying than like being alone in a boat on the ocean at night. Stars above, pure black below.”

Later in the book Collins describes how a trip to Mars might happen (unlike the moon mission, which only took 8 days, a Mars mission would likely take a 18 months), the creation of an orbiting city ‘Libra’, and the great potential for both disaster and advanced civilization we have. Did you know that only 66 years passed between the first Wright brothers flight and the moon landing? That’s just fucking crazy.

Spread from Gagarin's work published by Location Books

Lastly, I just received my copy of Location Books‘ first publication which features collages and ‘moonprints’ by Isa Newby Gagarin. It’s very well produced, in a small edition of 100, and features some visually interesting juxtapositions of found photographs and astrophotography. While the bits and pieces of text praising the benefits of laboratory-made diamonds are a bit confusing, the overall metaphor that Gagarin creates throughout the book is strong and inspiring. For Gagarin the moon is a photograph that develops and fades with the sun’s light. It’s an interesting project and works well in book form.

More moon thoughts to come…