Sometimes

 Reading Gertrude Stein. "The Making of the Americans" and being entranced by the cadence of the broken language that goes forward and back. Pulled some fragments and made a two-projector slide piece that I projected for a week on the inside of a shop window on a street in downtown Beverly Massachusetts.

My fascination with violence combined with Gertrude Stein's words about a man' "bottom nature" to help me say what I wanted to say about ..men. Big time men, sad men broken men, confused men, men in mourning, men in hate. men in fear.

I got no reaction from most of those who saw it. bBut it was a success to put it into the public realm

A post from back in 2020

This is an older post but it is interesting to see my reaction to Covid.

 I have not posted since January 15th 2020. I mentioned at the time that ANYEYE Film Lab had been to Colorado, Berlin Germany, and Nantes France. Being amazed at where my films had taken me.

A lot has happened since then. There has been a shift in things. Fear and caution have all but replaced curiosity and confidence. Travel is restricted, gatherings are restricted and interaction is now primarily over video conference calls. An opportunistic virus has brought our capitalist system to a standstill. At least the retail part of it. It seems odd, maybe ironic that a microbe could do this.
Memes are birthing and spreading as well. This has been the most depressing part of the three month experience. I do not feel like we are all in this together. Nor do I want to be a hero. I just want to be able to communicate in full sentenced with body language and gestures in real time and space.
I have taken on the task of renovating a two car garage. I want to turn it into a studio office space and make room for our 4 year old step grandson to have a room of his own.

The garage looks like this so far.

An earlier post from 2013

This is the seventh year of the ANYEYE blog. Since that time ANYEYE has been to France, Germany, Colorado, This cities of New York, Buenos Aires, London, and Barcelona. The film world has expanded to include film labs like us in Latvia, Australia, Mexico, and right nearby in Waltham.

Toronto

I just returned from a trip to Toronto. I had participated in a 5 day Film Labs meeting sponsored by L.I.F.T.  https://lift.ca/analogue-resilience-film-labs-gathering/

Two film world colleagues and I stayed in and Air B&B on the west side in a part of Toronto called "The Junction". We walked and talked a lot and spent much of time in discussion and at the events, seeing films and attending workshops.

I was inspired by the number of young people who have been drawn to analog film making. They brought a very broad range of skills and sensibilities to the event.

There was a clear focus on the environmental impact of photochemical processes and ways to mediate that impact. There were also presentations on DIY technical solutions to projection, sound production, and optical printing. High energy at every event.

I am really reassured at these meetings (Colorado Springs, Nantes, Berlin), how much alive the photochemical process is and how much it is expanding to include new technologies and processes.  I am encouraged that even though I may be somewhat isolated here in the burbs than there are artists from all over the world who are immersed in this form of image making.

ARTOMI in Ghent NY

On my way to Colgate in Hamilton NY. I stopped at ARTOMI, an large artpark in Ghent, NY. I spent an hour and a half and walked about three miles around the ground and still only saw about 1/3 of what is installed there.

Decided to break up the drive to Hamilton NY by stopping in  Chatham NY just across the MA/NY border.Staying in a small Airbnb outside of town and wanted to go "into town" for dinner.

Found the Blue Plate Restaurant right in the middle of town. Actually next to the railroad tracks. 

Good dinner in the restored bar in the basement. 

I will be visiting ArttOMI  in the town of Ghent NY tomorrow before I continue up to the Flaherty

Going to the Flaherty Seminars on Saturday

The legendary Flaherty is the meeting point for the political, poetical, experimental, Critical  and cultural world of Documentary films. I read about it all of the time and have done what I think is a good amount of homework in my narrow band of interest in Experimental Documentary.
I know that the contemporary realm of documentary is in flux just like the other worlds that I travel in. My intention is to be open and curious but not uncritical.

I am driving to Colgate where it is held and I look forward to an introspective two-day journey. I will stop in Chatham NY which is one of the primary locations of the first film I worked on back in 1971. We camped out in the Shaker Museum there to shoot interiors for an Historical drama aimed at Bicentennial release. It never happened as we had planned (long story) and we sold the negative footage, work print and the rough cut and the film is somewhere in California.

So I go back in time as I go west. Arrive in the NOW and bathe in the moment.