“It’s hard to write about nothing”  Patti Smith

I’ve been re-reading “M Train” and that line has stuck with me. Of course, she’s not really writing about “nothing” - her nothing is the stuff of our everyday existence. It is the “doing” of how we move through time and our life. I’ve always felt that you must love the “doing” of whatever art-form you end up pursuing. Photographers are constantly taking photographs…whether they have a camera or not. We are captured by the light, or an expression, or the way a set of lines converge or cut the sky into pieces. We  are passionate about a cause and how to best express / sequence / present it. It is in the “doing” that we spend our time as creatives - and I think it’s true about life in general. 

My latest “doing” continues to be the animated shorts. While the set has placed itself in the same original image, the process is changing. Now the path has evolved towards sound. Initially it seemed logical that each should have a soundtrack - but when I added music, it changed the visual…made it too pretty. So, instead of music, sounds have become interesting - using them as a narrative that guides and supports the visuals. Each segment is starting with a “sounds” track, which I listen to with my eyes closed…visualizing the imagery that will be laid in later. 

With the current set (screen capture above), I’m using rain and the modulation of the images to feel like you’re slipping in and out of this experience. At a recent art talk by Betty Ann Brown, I was taken with how she explored the difference between Art and Commerce. Commerce, (to paraphrase), is a set point that’s easily consumed and has a specific defined effect in mind. With Art…it’s much more vague as you shift into evocation, the unknown, the unsettled, the unresolved…which is where I seem to be heading.