Field Memos From My First Interview

1. think ahead about timing to minimize audio interference and lighting issues
- the sun, machinery and trains were problematic
- in this situation, how do you separate the voice from the background without clipping?

2. bring a handheld and an assistant to get good candids and b-roll
- too stiff with just the big camera on a tripod

3. avoid leading questions and avoid having to repeat questions
- How can I make the interview process more ethnographic and less staged?

4. Discuss documentary ethics with colleagues
- I want to present all sides. He was extremely positive. When I share the video with him and his company, will they be
upset when I also present negative reactions to the demolition?

Recoveries and Reclamations

Recoveries and Reclamations is a book by Judith Rugg and Daniel Hinchcliffe addressing the topic of reclaiming post industrial spaces.
“This second volume of the series ‘Advances in Art & Urban Futures’ brings together contributions from artists, sociologists, architects and cultural theorists in addressing the recoveries and reclamations being made within urban and rural landscapes as a result of the fallout of redevelopment in the 21st century.”

http://books.google.com/books?id=-oI237CBcXgC&dq=recovering+post+industrial+spaces

I’m hoping within this book I can find some influential artists addressing these issues.

Personal History with Gates

Today when I was filming a worker from Alpine Demolition came walking towards me. I thought he was going to kick me out and I was dreading the interaction. Turns out, he just wanted to chat and I’m happy he did. He, his mother and grandmother all worked at the Gates Factory! Now he is on the demolition team. Needless to say, he has mixed feelings about the situation. I’ve been wanting to interview people with a personal history/relation with the factory, but I figured it would be merely impossible to find these people, especially under my time constraints. Instead, they found me.

Project Research and References

Austin Allen is an independent filmmaker, scholar and architect. He explores issues associated with urban development and use of public spaces, particularly parks. His work addresses the need for well designed public space that accomodates all demographics.

Here are some quotes and reviews of his documentary “Claiming Open Spaces”:
“The city parks of Columbus, New Orleans, Detroit, Oakland and Montgomery, and the African-Americans who frequent them, are the subjects of this urban documentary. Public spaces, and the ways in which we use them, sometimes conflict with official city planning.”
-Media rights: http://www.mediarights.org/film/claiming_open_spaces

“The documentary is a critical exploration of the design of urban spaces, a personal journey, and a celebration of leisure, recreation, and resistance. “We’ve been taught to see without seeing,” notes Allen, “how to experience spaces while ignoring the cultural imprints and connections to people that make them significant.” -Austin Allen

”Claiming Open Spaces is guided by interviews with social activists, city planners, urban designers, poets, landscape architects, historians, and most importantly, the people who use urban parks.”
-University of Colorado

http://www.cudenver.edu/Who%20Am%20I/Faculty%20and%20Staff/Newsletter/Archives
/Archives%202004/Sept%202004/Sept%2004%20full%20story/Pages/Landscape.aspx

http://www.itvs.com/shows/ataglance.php?showID=7166

“Austin Allen’s documentary takes a controversial stance: that African Americans’ conception of open space is different from that of the mostly white civic authorities who have closed public parks in recent years, denying blacks a vital gathering place… In building his case, Allen…creates a fascinating history of black America.”
- The East Bay Express

http://www.thebeehive.org/Templates/HurricaneKatrina/Level3NoFrills.aspx?PageId=1.5369.6532.7341

This is an article about University of Colorado students meeting with residents of the lower ninth ward to discuss redevelopment ideas.

“We believe, without a doubt, that this could be a vibrant, vital community if the right decisions are made,” said Austin. “This reconstruction will be planned, the question is whether the residents here will participate in the planning of their community. We hope we can help mobilize the community so they can communicate with the powers that be.” Austin Allen

Professor and Landscape Architect Joern Langhorst is teaching a UCD class about recovering post industrial and abandoned landscapes. His students are studying the Gates Factory redevelopment and coming up with their own ideas.

“Since the 1970s, the reclamation of abandoned, disused and derelict landscapes that were a product of distinctive technological activities and uses has become a topic of increasing importance and discourse. Using four case studies, I explore the evolution of approaches, frameworks, and underlying constructs of both socio-cultural and eco-technological systems that influence or determine the treatment of post-industrial landscapes. My focus is on two types of post-industrial landscapes in particular: landscapes of industrial production and landscapes of waste and refuse. Finally, I suggest that design approaches that incorporate and retain physical traces of previous uses and allow the site history to inform its current and future condition and that design approaches that incorporate a participatory involvement of the surrounding communities facilitate more successful results. The understanding of design as a temporal and open-ended activity further enhances the potential to create meaningful and functional open spaces on post-industrial sites.”
-Jörn Langhorst

The following link is to a paper entitled Rebuilding the post-industrial landscape: Interaction between
landscape and biodiversity on derelict land by scholar and urban planner Chris Ling
http://www.changingplaces.org.uk/upload/documents/document3.pdf

windows as art

The Gates Factory has an abundance of windows, which I find the most beautiful part of the factory, especially the northern buildings. Through chemicals, paint and time, many of the windows have oxidized or stained. They become even more vibrant by the rusting metal and the red brick. They tranform into pieces of art that change with the light. Each window containing it’s own unique beauty.

The other morning, there were cop cars surrounding the southern building and glass was shattered all over the parking lot. Someone had snuck in and smashed all the top floor windows. The following day they were all boarded up and will soon completely vanish after one last dance with the wrecking ball. They will never again change with the light.

Gates Factory Memestorm

Gates Factory Objectives

My primary objective for the Gates Factory project is to present the historical and current situation regarding this factory and urban redevelopment in a beautiful but haunting way. Above all, I want to provoke a dialogue. I want to create awareness, making people think about this situation without telling them my opinion. I want to honor this factory, creating a shrine like representation. However, I also will show it honestly, including its flaws, presenting the reasons the majority wants to tear it down.

Right now I am thinking about a second phase that may include some dialogue and presentation of what the future holds for this space (and other similar historical spaces, for example, Coney Island). I want to find a balance between an informative but dry documentary and strictly a beautiful work of art. Right now, I am hesitant to add dialogue or even images of this second phase because I am enjoying the current aesthetic and minimalism. However, I also want this piece to work as an intelligent documentary that presents this controversial situation from all sides. I hope to get some feedback (from my professors, colleagues and the blogging community) regarding how I can successfully walk this line.

Conceptual Overview/Background: To create awareness and necessary dialogue regarding historical preservation, urban development and public spaces among peers, colleagues and the community at large. I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin. There was a ton of open space, farmland and water. Then my family moved to the northern suburbs of Denver. It was a shocking change of scenery even in the early nineties but now the development around my parents’ neighborhood is out of control. Is this sprawl really necessary to accommodate the population growth or are irresponsible decisions being made? I want to become more informed on this topic that has always affected me. I want to research development companies, public space policies, and also make comparisons globally. How does the United States compare with other countries of a similar economy? Are other countries dealing with population growth in similar ways or have they found a smarter, more responsible approach. What kind of public space protection do other countries have?

Artist’s Influences/Points of Departure:
*Filmmaker and Architect Austin Allen’s “Claiming Open Spaces”
-A documentary on urban development and public space.
*Architect Neotha Meirath exploring space redevelopment issues in New Orleans
*Architect and Professor Jörn Langhorst exploring Gates Factory redevelopment issues and ideas with UCD students.

Project Prior Art: Coney Island and Lakeside Holga Photo Essays (shown below)

Potential Outcomes/Appropriate Venue: I would like to submit this video to a documentary oriented film festival. I would also like to find a local gallery that may show it. In addition, depending on the outcome, this film could be appropriate for showing Architecture and Urban Development students and firms. Austin Allen, a landscape architecture professor at University of Colorado has a background and undergraduate degree in film. He makes films regarding public spaces and urban development. I would like to talk with him about this project, possible venues and possible collaboration. I am hoping, if I choose to include dialogue, Professor Allen will speak in my video regarding development choices and issues.

memestorm

I’m practicing the simple but useful brainstorm method I learned way back in grammar school to focus on my influences, concerns, thought process and goals. So far these are just topic sketches that I will dive into as my ideas progress. Despite feeling vulnerable sharing my process, I hope to receive some helpful feedback from others, get in touch with my framework and develop my focus.

Seeking Refuge

This idea came to me like most do… in a dream and I woke up thinking about it. I want to do an extensive media/communication project and documentary involving refugees in Denver and their family and friends still living abroad.

I’ve been wanting to work with refugees and this desire was solidified through a Little Voice volunteer experience at the Spring Institute last year. The Spring Institute offers free classes for refugees that have just arrived in the states. They teach them English and practical skills, like writing a resume and filling out a job application. These people have just arrived, they are totally overwhelmed, displaced and confused, but regardless of who or what they have left behind, they are incredibly positive and kind. A fundamental reason I am passionate about documentary work is the chance to work with people and help them tell their stories. I want to use art and technology primarily as a tool for communication, awareness and social change.

This project would consist of many chapters and is perhaps it would take years to develop… I would start the project this year and hopefully take it beyond my studies. It would also require some grants.

Chapter One: teaching basic media classes to a group of refugees, putting media into their hands. I would teach them how to tell their own story. I would teach them how to make their own videos using consumer cameras and perhaps podcasts using inexpensive digital recorders. I would teach them how to edit, how to upload videos to Utube and DVD. If I meet refugees who are musicians, this project could have an audio focus as well.

Chapter Two: teaching them ways to apply these technical/media skills through employment or school.

Chapter Three: a small group and I (perhaps one or two others) traveling to meet families and friends still living abroad and delivering the footage… assuming there is a digital devide, not much access, if any, to the internet. We would then teach the family and friends how to respond through the same basic media classes, facilitating an exchange.

Chapter Four: Simultaneously I would document this entire process creating a documentary of the documentaries, a simulacra. In addition to the project’s web presence, I would have an exhibit showing their work and the documentary. The exhibit could be held in a gallery but would be ideal in a community center, a library, or any public space with a wide demographic and lots of traffic. (Chicago Cultural Center for example)

The most rewarding moments I have had as a photographer was delivering photos either in person or through others to people I have photographed while traveling (or locally). When I was traveling in Guatemala I befriended and photographed local Mayan people in a small village. Two years later some friends were traveling to this same village and I sent prints with them. The people were amazed and touched when my friend found them and they received these prints two years later. I imagine this situation would be that much greater if these were autobiographical videos from someone they thought they may never see again.

One of my favorite documentaries is “Born Into Brothels,” where a woman around my age lives with the women and children at a brothel in Calcutta. She is a photographer and teaches the children photography. They are empowered through this new skill, creating amazing images and telling their own stories. I was inspired by this documentary and now hope to create a similar project through new media.