In some ways I was lucky that much of last week was rainy, because I had tons to do. Despite the rain however, we still wanted to explore. Somehow a balance was struck.
After a day or two of trying to get some of the minutia of being an artist out of the way, we decided to set out hiking again. This time up the fell in our backyard, that being Saana. The map says 4kms each way, but we easily added another 6kms in diversions.
Heather documented every single spray painted trail marker on the way up. I'll let her post about that.
I'm going to back up a bit. In preparation for an upcoming show, I had to get a visualization that corresponds to viewers heart rates working properly. Luckily I had the wonderful John Wenksovitch (our collaborator on IMMOR(t)AL, one of the projects we have been working on here at AB) to help me to get a very finicky TFT Raspberry Pi screen working correctly. Definitely not a plug and play effort. Despite set back after set back, we finally succeeded.
IMG_2921
Liberated from that stress, we set out up the fell. I won't bore you with a written recollection, instead I'll post pictures.
Heather and I.
I have a ton of photos of this trek on Heather's dSLR, and will post them in a subsequent photo only post.
I should show some of the Ars Bioarctica specific work I've been doing. The project is kind of a sub-project of a larger body called 'Repatriated'. My website says the following: Repatriated will be an ongoing body of work that traverses the often muddled waters of globalization, colonialism, and territorial disputes. By repatriating objects, ideas, sounds, DNA and other artifacts and remnants of influence by people and powers in territories historically far from their ancestral homes.
Being that Heather and I are based in Leipzig, Germany for the summer, we are about 50kms from the former Junkers factory in Dessau.
For my Ars Bioarctica edition of 'Repatriated', I am taking non-object residues (sounds, images, video, plant samples, possible DNA samples, and microbial samples) from around the crash site of the downed German Junkers Ju88 bomber that sits at the base of Saana.
These residues and remnants will be 'repatriated', a phrase that brings with it many unsettling connotations in respect to a Nazi bomber.
Here are a couple of pictures of where I took samples, which will end up inoculating plates. Also some of the plant life. Shameless self promotion in 3...2...1...You can see a more in depth explanation, and find updates on my website. Here is the link: http://byronrich.com/Repatriated-Ongoing
That is it for now! The next post will be of all the lovely animals that I've encountered around the house, and in the surrounding hills.