~e; anonymous EM artwork

[brian carroll <human@electronetwork.org>]

  i once photographed holiday lights with an
  early digital camera and now look forward
  to the winter season for this event. it is
  a little different without snow in Minnesota
  which throws a lot of the experience off the
  regular course. so too with photographing a
  house with lights, capturing it did not have
  the same excitement as it is much easier with
  improved cameras, though also less exciting
  in a way. here are some earlier photographs:

http://www.electronetwork.org/assemblage/zone6/holidaylights2.htm
http://www.electronetwork.org/assemblage/zone6/holidaylights1.htm

  IN any case, i had been experimenting with a
  the 'close-up' feature of digital cameras, in
  which an item between 5" and 20" inches from
  the lens (as an example) is somehow adjusted
  to by the camera after pressing a button on
  the camera. so, i tried using it to photograph
  what to me is an impressionist-like scene at
  the Lyndale nuclear peace garden in minneapolis.
  it was probably 50-80 feet away or so and thus
  everything is out of focus though still legible.
  there is something about this that made me wonder
  about what is unique to digital photography in
  that this imagery can be seen before choosing to
  take the photograph. and it relates to holiday
  lighting as will be shown in a minute, too...

  Lyndale Peace Garden, nearsighted focus
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/peacebridge.jpg

  to me it looks as if it is painted, then i thought
  of it again with night lighting and painting with
  light. Moholy-Nagy i thought did such experiments,
  and i decided to try it with holiday lights. maybe
  someone else has done this extensively though i've
  yet to see it. if so, please share what you know...

  the one light scene that triggered my interest this
  year was a very heartfelt expression for a tree that
  is located on the corner of a residential block. it
  had a few strands of green and red 'rope light' which
  is basically some bulbs in a colored plastic tubing.
  it was very elegant and an intimate expression to
  find, when other places wrap excess wattage all over,
  this was a profoundly moving understatement and the
  tree remains the most important thing, as if loved
  (and, reminiscent of the story, the Giving Tree...)

  here is a basic night photograph of the tree itself:
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/treetrunk.jpg

  here are experiments with moving the camera during
  the exposure, using the same treetrunk of lights...

http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/lighttrunk.jpg

  this second photograph then opened up an interpretation
  of the lights, at least for me, that started to capture
  the feeling of seeing the tree that was beyond the image
  of the tree itself and its light, sketching experience...

  larger image files (100-200k each) of the lightshow...

http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light1.jpg
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light2.jpg
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light3.jpg
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light4.jpg
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light5.jpg

  here is another lightscene with this technique...

nearsighted focus of trees
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light6b.jpg

moving exposure of trees
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/light6.jpg

so while there are photographs which document
a scene there is still something missing, which
may be due to skill but also of interpretation...
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/trees.jpg

this reminds me of the long exposure of freeways/
highways at night. this is a bus passing a tele-
vision station (bus is on the left, with tall
light streaking across the image). the thought
came to mind about the camouflage of electrical
towers and pylons, like Robert Venturi's look at
signage in Las Vegas which changed from day to
night; at night the electrical towers and their
landscape become more visible, almost, as they
have red lights blinking that rise in the dark
sky, which is another landscape hidden in the
chaos of the daytime, in full relief at night,
and yet how to photograph it? maybe the moving
exposure will be one way of exploring these.
http://www.electronetwork.org/temp2/kstp.jpg

that, and car lights and especially if airplanes
could be photographed when circling above a city,
using long exposures, such as a series of planes
coming in for landings one after another and a
several second exposure with night photography.
(or day photography with neutraldensity filter).

there is something about what people do with
electrical light and decorations that is also
related to anonymous electromagnetic artworks
and documenting this is of interest. if others
see any such scenery locally that you want to
share with the list, please send an URL or a
note to me if you need temporary upload space.

in any case, that tree is still my favorite and
i consider it a type of celebration using light.
brian

  brian thomas carroll: research-design-development
  architecture, education, electromagnetism
  http://www.electronetwork.org/bc/

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