Bob Levene

One Metre Pace – Tests.

I’ve continued to explore peoples estimations of one metre. I wanted to find a more direct visual way of presenting the results whilst directly linking it to the original action & moment of estimation. Lining up the camera level and straight at 50mm I took before and after photos of a single metre pace. The crop width is one metre and the height is determined by the original camera proportions. Any over estimations are simply cut off, as are some of the heads of the people – height depending of course. Not only am i interested in combining the variations & inaccuracies of peoples estimations with the measured, but I’m also curious about the graphic representations of the findings. I like the image composition being determined by something outside of the purely aesthetic. I’m also increasingly aware of the photographic plane as document of an area of time, distance & space.

Marey’s Sphygmographe, 1859

Something that is fascinating me about Marey’s work is the idea of graphic inscription and data recording being a direct result of a physical action. The picture above shows his Sphygmographe which recorded the beating of the pulse. I’m interested in the scientific approach not only to measuring but also to recording direct visual data, the graph-(ic) representation as a means of making the transient fixed in time.

Lars estimating one metre

Graph representing six peoples estimations of one metre

I asked six people to tell me how big a metre was, they held their hands up and then I measured the estimation. The two red verticle lines respresent one metre length apart and each of the six horizontal lines is one persons guess. Everybody underestimated, the closest guess was 99cm and the furthest was 62cm. I have also been taking photographs around the Artists Unlimited house, partly as a technical excercise (getting used to my new digital camera) & partly as a way to re-explore ideas around framing, light & composition. I hope that these two areas of investigation will meet at some point later on in the residency. You can see the photos in the folder Interiors on my Flickr page.

During the next three months i will be Artist in Residence at Artists Unlimited in Bielefeld, Germany. I’ve had a few areas of interest floating around in my head for a while which i intend to use as a starting point. Mainly based around the photographic and graphic image, I’m particuarly interested in the comparisons of the eye and the lens. My continued interest in scientfic approaches, namely ‘the measured’ as truth has left me wanting to explore visual data representation (graphs). This will no doubt also be linked to my interests in space, time and distance. I’m currently reading Picturing Time by Marta Braun a study of the work of Etienne-Jules Marey and The Eye, A Natural History by Simon Ings. The picture above was an idea that i was mucking around with in Finland, the masking tape marks the view of the video camera in shot. On a side note i’ve also learnt to knit!

Section of Finnish Archipelago, image download from Turunmaan Seutu.

Most of the inhabited islands in the Archipelago are connected by ferry, they are interconnecting life lines and are designed to carry cars. There has been a long standing row amongst locals as to whether more bridges or tunnels should be built replacing some of the shorter ferry rides, because although they are regular (waiting time can be up to 1 hour) in the tourist season cars can be queing for quite some time. I’ve been thinking about how our pace of life is determined by our technological and infrastructural limits and the relationship and expectancy we have with technology and speed.

Islands from Granvik Ferry, Archipelago. Still from Video

In last few weeks i’ve been going back to the Archipelago exploring and filming  two different ferry routes in particular, one which weaves from island to island and one that goes back and forth between Pargas and Nauvo. Both travel at a constant speed and are surprisingly smooth, pointing my camera away from the ferry I have been focusing on the horizon line and the islands that pass by. The shot encompasses a range of different speeds, the speed of the sea, sky and islands (which vary depending on distance from the camera) and of course the speed of the ferry.

UPDATE ON FEBRUARY 22nd 2010: This work developed into Inertial Frame