Tonight we head north after 9 months of very detailed planning with the Cape Farewell team. We are collectively relieved, excited and somewhat proud. Vicky, Hannah, Kathy, Nina, Lisa and I have lived and breathed this reality and now we voyage north with what I believe is a quite outstanding group of highly creative artists, musicians, comics, poets, architects, craft based artists, film makers, writers… I’ve been speculating about whether such a powerful creative group has every been assembled before to address what is a culture and life threatening future truth. We will spend ten days together in the High Arctic working with the scientists and crafting our own response. As Vanessa Carlton has put it, ‘to challenge a stubborn world’.
The past two weeks have been hectic with the youth launch in Toronto [thank you Leslie] followed by a fantastic gathering at Vanessa’s loft in New York, a presentation in Strasbourg and our London Launch at the Science Museum with Prof. Chris Rapley, Dr. Simon Boxall and KT Tunstall. This has made us very visible and Hannah and Kathy have put together a very sexy internet communication machine so that all can follow us live as we work in the north.
Many of the artists have projects planned and as you can see from my frantic last minute packing, I too am planning video projections – a physical theatre. Bolted to the front of the ship is a container with all the science equipment, projectors, lighting and a piano [electric]. The ship has passed through two storms getting to the West coast of Greenland so I hope all this stuff is OK.
Tomorrow morning [very early] the US and the European groups get together for the first time in Reykjavik before we complete the final leg of our journey to the ship. This is an outstanding effort with people coming from far away places, LA, New York, Canada, France, Scotland, Holland, Italy, England… I can’t wait until we can all join the boat and voyage north. The weather promises a bit of a blow for Saturday which should bring the first winter snow and a whitening of the landscape and next week looks to be very clear and cold, -7C. We are declaring a Cape Farewell independent time zone on the ship to make the most of the daylight hours and to give Peter Gilbert and his film crew the best chance to work. Roll on the northern lights.
I’ve just noted that we have just received the support of the UK Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, for our expedition. Thank you to him, and for his speech on Tuesday where his climate commitment received a vociferous welcome from the assembled audience. We do need the political will and a cultural shift to be able to look our kids and future generations in the eye and say, yes, we did act.
Davids luggage
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11 Comments
clare twomey
Good luck on the first leg of your journey today David and the Artist Crew. Will be with you all the way. x clare t
Karen Lacroix
Good luck David (and the whole team). I will follow your trip for the next ten days.
Yesterday there was a spitch from Martin Rose (Director Canada, British Council) at the Canadian High Commission in London for the the opening of the exhibition – The Global Change. There was beautiful images visualizing the landscapes of our planet changing.
Martin talked about his trip he did with the Canadian students (Cape Farewell/ Canada) over North America for the past ten days. He said it was a fantastic experience. Susi Arnott told me how excited the experience was with the students and the whole crew.
Both Martin and Susi had an amazing and powerful energy from this adventure.
Hope I can joined one day.
Good luck everyone.
Karen Lacroix
http://www.karenlacroix.com
Sandy Clipsham
Whoa – that is some heavy artillery for shooting (photos). I seriously hope you’re not shrouded in fog for the next two weeks!
This is an impressive website and I look forward to following the expedition blogs over the coming days. Bon voyage,
Sandy
Ben Mills
good luck to you all – sounds like an awesome effort. lots of us ordinary folk are watching and rooting for you – hold on!
Ben
ps say hi to me old mate vick!
liz dudley
What a life-changer you are on…creative minds have got the power to use their language to shout loud enough to be heard…enjoy the journey.
Olly Watts
Hi David – You inspired our Bern Convention meeting in Strasbourg recently – may this trip help inspire the world towards a better place.
Dan Harvey
Hi David and company, so finally have managed to get on line here in Sao Paulo, looks like your having fun, even with the larger ship I thought sea sickness might be a problem – hope that everyone finds their sea legs or that you can get on land a fair bit. The Arctic seems so far a way from this crazy dirty city, too many people, too much traffic, and terrible air quality! Seems no one cares about their enviroment here, let alone climate change. Hope to meet with Charlie’s friend Andres Furtardo from Greenpeace next week, and hopefully give a talk about our works and the Cape Farewell project once our show opens. Having a few problems with projector here – burns through the negative in 5 seconds – hope to resolve that tomorrow!!
Take Care and send my Love to everyone and have a truly creative time.
All Best Dan xx
Birdie
David
I just saw this about your video projections. How did they go? I actually am a projectionist – film and digital. Museums to Movie Studios to Movie Palaces. I would LOVE to project off the deck – but – my choice would be very unique and rare projectors that we used in the last century to provide background images – like the scenery going by whilst someone is in a car. They are specially modified to run in sync with 35mm motion picture cameras. This would allow me to film what I was projecting on to the icebergs (the arctic is clearly one very large movie screen canvas for me) – without out any issues from the shutter. Further, the lamphouses are carbon arc, producing a high intensity full spectrum white light and that would not be effected by the cold altho the electric line and all connections would have to be totally waterproof as they use a lot of juice and I am sure the deck is exciting enough, as is. ahem. Did you project slides? a powerpoint show? Video is useful in that you can squeeze so many different things through it. A 35mm projector only accepts 35mm film. But, the quality of the images and the light source and that you can sync up with a 35mm film camera, puts it in a class all its own. I gather higher contrast images project the best? Did you try only at night? My luck, I’d project a big mack truck rumbling across a berg and the thing would calve off, haha. 747 takes off across another and with a big BANG! These projectors, and I have used them on location, weigh a ton a piece. I would probably anchor – strap – secure (you get the picture) one on each side of the deck….rather than pull one behind me to which ever side had the best “screens”. I can pull them about on my own, but…even with a crew to help – it wouldn’t be a good idea on a wet cold slippery moving deck…I am going to ring Godrey Reggio, Director of the Qatsi film trilogy. I worked on “Koyaanisqatsi” with him and his non-profit The Institute for Regional Education. “Koyannisqatsi” does have a lot of footage in it, I would love to project there – even the whole film for all aboard, but there is also reams of stock footage that never made it in any of the films I am going to ask him about, and Ron Fricke, the DP. I have also worked with IMAX, and Ron would be ideal to shoot any projections for IMAX. I’m thinking of making a short film of it. Dan Harvey who commented above me should get ahold of me asap re: projector problems. I really hope they were not actually trying to project film negative? and it was burning? Negatives are the originals used to make all copies – copies are the only thing that should be projected as they get damaged. anyway, I am curious to see how the projecting went – if you need a hand on that – holler – and I will give Godfrey a ring soon as it would be a wonderful project for us, and if we couldn’t hook up with you all – I guess, there are fishing boats we could head out on. If you arre unfamiliar with Koyaanisqatsi, ask about the ship. KOY- AAN-NIS- QATSI. It’s the hopi indian word meaning Life out of Balance A state of life that calls for another way of Living. Cheers. Birdie
Birdie
just a heads up – I’ve left a message this sunday oct 5th for Godfrey at The Institute for Regional Education. I shall hear back from him when he checks in, no doubt.
Birdie
Yes, Godfrey rang back, excited. He totally got what I was going on about…There is footage that wasn’t used in the Qatsi trilologys I can have access to, he offered me some other suggestions, which dove tail into my original idea and the need for PSA’s and an educational campaign that would be The Most Effective use of it all. Merch – bumper stickers, t-shirts, calendars are all good places to go to provoke thought and nudge people, filming specific text & images on the bergs – being 100% honest about the process (burning carbon sticks to produce the light that projects the images – the last centuries way of building a campfire – make a cave painting) and making it the last time I do it….(use carbon arc) – then, besides the merch made of those filmed images/text – a billboard campaign. This was Godfrey’s contribution. They would make spectacular billboards and really be provocative. Weapon of Mass Destruction as text – still of a 747 taking off while projected on an iceberg. Could this all be done in photoshop. Well, the water droplets in the bergs and the ice itself, would create a bit of a beaded screen type of an effect, I am sure, and that would be very hard to replicate in Photoshop. My thought is that it would more along the lines of cave paintings rather than straightforward film…a bit leaning more towards uneven luminosity and impressionistic….more like moving paintings than photo’s.
Cheers Birdie
I did find the youtube vid on the earlier expedition, and you probably heard me chuckle as I saw you projecting the text. I am curious as to how the lenses do with the cold from the outside and any heat from the lamp? Did you get condensation? I found the blogs here around the 28th and didn’t backtrack and find this one until later. I had no idea you were doing projections! Funny. But this is what I do, and write and photograph, so it is how I deal with things. I’ve so far developed a pretty clear line of projects – all connected – all that do create a campaign – and that brings it all home to everybody in thought provoking ways and I have ideas of a few sources of support for funding and different legs of it – some that Godfrey suggested. He is raising funds for a new project of his now. Ron Fricke is on the road shooting a new one of his one, and I will be contacting one of the producers of Koyannisqatsi – who produces for the Discovery channel now. I do not know what your plans are for future expeditions, but I think we need to get Alaska on the map, and I need to look into the berg situation there as for starters – we would burn less carbon getting the equipment there from here….and…all things considered, a spotlight on Alaska where 99% of all glaciers are thinning and melting now is key. It is also a part of the USA and hits closer to home on many levels. I will keep thinking on things. Did you ever see the campaigns that happened around smoking? Very effective. I could do filmed and print work with this….and, merch. I am off my normal work til 2009, so have time now to develop new things. I will need to piggyback and also work with different groups to do this. You can contact me via my myspace link posted here. Have fun with your sea legs ashore now
Birdie
David
I am moving at a quick pace. I want to do this as a print & billboard ad campaign that carries the message, and creates PSA’s that can be broadcast. I need to find a sponsor. Will contact, Ad Busters. Remember the Beniton ads that provoked a big response? Right, so…am looking for a sponsor like that. Um. The end product for the PSA’s will be…shot on a soundstage, with film of an iceberg with a projected image of a 747 taking off. Seated at the base of the screen will be an actual (retired) airline pilot, under a spotlight. He/she will announce facts about carbon emissions & air travel.
Another one will involve a truck projected on an iceberg and a truck driver seated in front of the screen, and so on….
I am researching rail lines to alaska, bio diesel for the gennies to run the projectors and am looking for a fishing boat that may run off bio diesel, etc….
Palin doesn’t see me coming in her rear view mirror, but I have definitely hit the ground, running…