Shifting Perspectives developed as an extension of the Slow Races videos where subtle traces of time were documented and miniscule changes were magnified through the medium of video.
Andre Tarkovsky developed the idea of “poetic film” wherein poetry is achieved through the internal rhythm of a shot over great lengths of time; the developing rhythm is defined by the movement within the frame and the pressure of the passing time running through the shot. Rather than dictating the film's rhythm with external splices and cuts, Tarkovsky sculpts time within the frame to express something more significant, truthful, and poetic than the actual events within the frame thereby forcing the viewer to make an intellectual leap of their own.
Tarkovsky worked with real time using real film. Slow Races was recorded in real time crunched up into megapixels, stored on a memory card, and transferred via fire wire onto the editing table of my laptop. I feared a disconnect of time/media/method.
In 2004, art critic Robert Hughes responded to a negative trend that he believed to be occurring in the art and design spheres of practice. Far too reliant on fast results and fast medium, he proclaimed that, “what we need more of is slow art: art that holds time as a vase holds water: art that grows out of modes of perception and whose skill and doggedness make you think and feel; art that isn’t merely sensational, that doesn’t get its message across in 10 seconds, that isn't falsely iconic, that hooks onto something deep-running in our natures.”
In that spirit, with a real camera and with real film, I documented further slow races. The film was processed by hand and the resulting images were submitted to the photogravure process — an undeniably slow process that reveals subtleties unseen to the camera eye.
Throughout the process I watched: coaxing each drop of water to fully realize its detail; filtering unseen light into the faintest highlights; and ever-monitoring the ph of the three ferric chloride acid baths to uncover the very last whisper of shadows.
I slowly captured slowness.
