36 Views of a Bridge
36 Views of a Bridge is an interactive film that uses time-lapse photography to explore the converging worlds surrounding the Veterans Memorial Bridge. The exhibit will premiere at Ingenuity Festival 2009, where participants can interact with a state-of-the-art multi-touch user interface to vote on which scenes from the film will play next.
Trailer #1:
Trailer #2:
Multi-Touch Interface for Ingenuity Festival:
More About the Project:
I have always admired Hokusai’s 36 Views of Mt. Fuji and Hiroshige’s later 100 Views of Mt. Fuji. Each woodcut has Mt. Fuji somewhere in the scene, but it is rarely the central focus of the composition. Instead, these artists focus on the myriad kinds of life and human endeavor that go on in Japan. Mt. Fuji is the visual and spiritual anchor to which all of these scenes are tied, a reminder of the way in which we are all connected. In this project I am using the Veterans Memorial Bridge as a similar anchor for a study of Cleveland. Instead of woodcuts, time-lapse photography is my primary medium. Time-lapse photography has a unique ability to show us these emergent patterns that often unfurl at time scales too slow for us to notice. Over three seasons, I have filmed the bridge from multiple positions at different times of day and weather conditions. I have also filmed different transit routes that intersect the bridge location, and areas of Cleveland that relate to the bridge in more abstract ways. I try to show the patterns that we participate in, and emerge without our knowledge, and the diversity of paths that intersect at the bridge location, both real and metaphorical. As thousands of people live their individual lives, the city lives and breathes an emergent life of its own.
The film produced from these multiple views of the bridge will be displayed in an interactive exhibit at both festival locations. In the center of a dimly lit room there will be an interactive digital map of the city, centered on the bridge. The film will be projected on one of the walls at all times. Participants will be able to touch locations on the map to transition the film to footage taken at that location. Information such as viewing angle, time of day, season, and weather conditions may also be displayed on the map. Several composers are also developing original music to accompany the scenes in the film.