Rethinking Newfoundland

It is the second day that I sit at the computer trying my best to compile Newfoundland video. I watch the sky knowing darn well that if starts raining, as it looks like it will, I will drop it in a split second so to make a new video. It is nothing new to report that I have absolutely no relationship with editing. I slowly build knowledge in the area, but feeling no connection to it as well as being trapped indoors seems to build resentment. I want to get rained on, wind burnt, sunburned with new footage in hand rather than being pale and comfortable in the editors chair.

I have been reviewing footage that I never really had time to look at. Amazing surprises were there. I particularly like the video where I stumble upon the plankton bloom. Tight, fractured scenes that were trying to decipher what it was that I was seeing. First thinking it was a lens flare, then realizing it was life. A living flowing permeable red carpet of life. Keep in mind too that I was shooting remote, up on the rocks keeping one eye on the always angry sea, and the other eye on the glare on the screen. I was three feet from being swept in. Three feet from death at all times. I took every video as if it was my last, considering that the pull dropped the camera to the bottom and held it there hovering like a yellow warning to myself, I never took anything for granted. Those entire two weeks of the bloom filming were very dangerous. One day I watched the sea for an entire hour before going to its edge. For hyperactive me, sitting with a mug of coffee, all geared up ready to roll and not filming was hard. I paced back and forth, watched the sky turn over seven times, while the sea just looked very unpredictable. I am not going to pretend that I was able to frame much of that time. The sea was filming, I was trying to keep one camera in, one camera and myself out of the sea.

I Made 115 or so-20min videos during that artist residency left an amazing collection that can appear daunting at times. The great thing is that so much of it really footage that I love. There are redundant segments, but really about anyone you grab is worth a look. The exception being the interviews of me looking very wind burnt (see me casting a boat in seaweed above) in Carhart bibs and lug boots trying to explain why I am launching a camera off the slipway, over the cliff, through the blowhole or shoving the camera under the ice. My words say nothing. I rattle on in vain with eyes on the waves. The images say everything.

Exerpt from Travel Log Newfoundland,
June 1, 2007
"Dipped to freezing, so not a great time to dry seaweed. If I get them all cleaned and dry, it will simply be a matter of assembly. (Waterhorse project casting the boat in seaweed) This shoreline seaweed turns purple black when dry. It is the most accessable variety-able to pluck great quanities off the rocks by the boat launch. Seaweed looses a bit of itself when the sea water is taken away. So...hike to the iceberg or stay here warm and working...The wind cut and the sea calmed, so I should check to see if it(iceberg) is still there. I'll have a walk toward town and have a look along the coast."
June 2, 2007
"Nope, It was gone. The iceberg gone and another dead seal washed in...the seal looked peaceful in death. Silver dapled with freckles. Still think I should have been a wildlife tracker or something. Seem to have an eye for it. Problem of late seems to be that all of the creatures besides the neighbor dogs, the crows or any multi celled creatures above ocean diatoms I am only finding after they are dead. Not a lot of "tracking" involved. I returned back to the cabin to bake a cake, then got back onto the rocks to turn over all the seaweed to dry the other side before dusk. Think the neighbors smelled the cake, as they seem to be circling about on ATV's zooming along the kitchen wall"