SRD puttering about: MFA studio in Process

This work is a turning point in my understanding of my practice. Modeling possible directions from the results of research, reading, process writing, test shooting, sketching and discussing my ideas with Lance, Amy and my cohort, has allowed me to imagine a direction where the different ideals of art making I am captivated by, can coexist in my practice.

This new vision of what my art can be is allowing me to focus on a creating a framework of constructing a piece that frees me of the nagging pressure of constantly having to explain to myself what possible direction my work can take as I am making it.

This project relies on video material I started shooting in Vermont throughout last semester, some of which I have shown in various forms in the spring and earlier this semester. I kept collecting & shooting through summer, while massaging, analysing and synthesising the material and the ideas behind it this semester.

I am now in the process of writing the various short scripts and creating additional material (Soundscapes, Music, graphical elements, etc.) that will be combined to create the final long form project.

The Timescale of A Passing Fancy…

The project consists of 4 parts/acts which are each further segmented into chapters.

  • Act 1: The Child.
    • 1: Threshold
    • 2: The Kingdom
    • 3: The Sovereign
    • 4: Adventures
https://vimeo.com/490547511/e185752a77

Adventures of a 47y old urban black man, with his 7y old rural BFF.
This is the section that has had the most work, and of which I have shown many clips and edits of. It Focus on my relationship and adventures with my blonde 7year old god child, as we play in the Green Mountains of VT.

  • Act 2: The Life.
    • The City
    • Train of thought
    • America
https://vimeo.com/490545247/aaef7bb0f4

For This is the section I will be reliant on data, photographs I have shot, as well as found material and my own text.
Here I am walking through my life in Philadelphia, and later in Wilmington, presenting my life in the city, it’s effects on my consciousness, as well as the weight of the poverty that dominates the american experience.

  • Act 3: Millenia.
    • Water
    • Decay
    • Existence

This is the section mainly uses landscape footage I shot during my time in Vermont, with text which I will be incorporating mostly as voice overs, although some of it might be in situ.
Here I am walking through the different scales of time that we unconsciously live by, and accept without thinking. I use a combination of images and talk about the science and natural history as well as project stories of imagined existences onto the landscape.

  • Act 4: So we say.
    • A mixtape
    • All in Order
    • We have yet to understand each other
    • and so we say
First attempts at astral photography.
The milky way, etc... will try to have more precise information next time
Hancock, VT, USA 5/26/20: 1-27am-1-3 Lat: 43° 55′ 49.9368″ N. DMS Lon: 72° 53′ 23.2296″ W. UTM

This is the section is the conclusion of the piece, containing aspects of all of the others, but creating a new visualscape out of that same material.
Here I will be asking for an answer, offering a possibility, and merely closing the book on this story.

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