Four Shapes of Pensacola

Pensacola Epilogue #1

Well it’s been just over 4 months since we got back from Pensacola. So much has happened. As soon as we got back, a flood of administrative and teaching duties came our way from having been away. And then, a few days later, I got really sick with symptoms remarkably similar to COVID-19, and passed it on to Alex. Then as we were both recovering we were told to prepare for the University to shut down.

The ensuing months were difficult but enlightening. We tried to keep up production but the reflection needed to understand the pandemic situation and enforced isolation inhibited a free flow of ideas. We still very much valued the experiences we had in Florida and the data we collected, but they became distant very quickly as the more immediate situation enfolded.

It wasn’t a complete shutdown of creative activities. We tried to work with the Camellia scan data. We processed it in different ways. After a while we had to admit we just weren’t falling in love with them. There was just something about the composition, the too-much-ness of Camellias, that thwarted our efforts. It may be that they can’t be treated as a standalone study. They may find themselves interjected into the other works. And this, in a way, seems fitting given the way we encountered them in Pensacola. They were very ordered, prim, in contrast to the wildness of the bayou and forests. Yes, they were everywhere in the city but somehow seemed like an addition. Like a lawn. Here is a frame from one study of the Camellia data:

camellia scans

Camellia scans processed through Touch Designer.

Recently as things have started to reopen and become more predictable, I started to play around with the shapes we had scanned on a rainy day. I also started to think about the colours we saw when we went down to the beachfront — bright joyful colours reminiscent of carefree beach holidays. This too seemed to be Pensacola. Again the contrast. In the end I made a composition of 4 of the shapes onto bright saturated backgrounds (featured at the top of this post). It may still change (maybe the camellias make an appearance??). We want to try printing it with the Risograph at Emily Carr. This is a standalone study for the mushroom shape (the accident that started it all):

Mushroom Shape

An accidental mushroom

There is still much to investigate and document from our time in Florida and we will keep going in fits and starts as we deal with all the changes in our lives.

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July 23 Detail of gathered materials

Epic Walk Diaries (July 23)

        permission to enter
   thank you for asking
          a past-teenage pass
      fields of chicory
         purply bright bitters

   river boat smell crows feasting
       on pungent impermanence

a true path
   a mud bypass
 beside a more river
at ease

      pump station
  prompts chaotic strategies
    inhibiting bacteria
      doubles us back
  to musqueam academy

 permission to enter
    yes 
      some may not be as nice
 beware of the fore

        Amigo greets us
          at La Finca
     zucchini blessings for all
   sleeping pumpkins
         waiting for halloween
    fore ball     pumpkin wow
  two hundred orange pounds
          not Portlandian

     figs roses sunflowers
         (not smiley yellow)
            mourning Gilbert
     Gilbert with the new apple tree
       
          smiles on imperfect grass
     river path edible sweetness
       Bauer bench
           a note to return

 a road to helpful extraordinary lips
        directed lively
   
   shaded limpid creek
 leaning queen anne
    thistles push pull poke
       guarding a soft finish

         fruity amble
          passed white history
      winched   embarrassing riches
             river cops
      doubly taken land

    ripe bounty
        chalky jade
     anne bourne moments
   groomed wildness
      village permeability
 inaccessible secure wealth
         wild boundaries
   generous contradictions

   damson plum finish

----
[
  Start 10:10
  End 2:20
  Musqueam Cultural Rotunda,
  to the river, cul-de-sac, back to Lola,
  to the Musqueam golf and learning academy,
  on Groomed Paths by the water, up to 51st ave,
  back down to the water, more Groomed Paths,
  along country club, past Deering Island, 
  Groomed (Fruity) Paths,
  Mccleery Golf Course, picnic under plum tree, 
  clean finish at Carnarvon St and Celtic Ave.
]
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gathered materials

Epic Walk Diaries (November 18)

monochrome golden
  determination
delightfully interruped
     by
 sari orange
pink orange
 red or turmeric
   yes but shimmery

it's like a two-shelled
  berry
    the inner berry is
     ummm orange
 sari orange

the sweetness of mom

 frost! November
muck
  so satisfying
   imagine being barefoot

listen look
    a calling bird
  brambles
   silence    we wait
   leaves quiver
 weaving as hopping
  as small as a finch

we want order
  no chaos
 no, chaos
   chaos!!!!

fear
  the ultimate investigation?
 or one like any other
   which tunnel to go down
 do all tunnels lead to...
  no head?

layers of white
  fireweed forests
 curled by gravity
    hooked by brambles
     so much stuff
  that can be grabbed onto
 don't worry. they love you.

the absence spoken
 of skeleton leaves
   tissue-like   materialized
  the magic of attention

defiant yellow
  untriggered!
    brilliant life burst
   in brown entropy
 a tertiary display

the rest of canada hates us

----------
[
  Start 2:30pm
  End 4:30pm
  Pacific Spirit lot, back to Acadia beach,
  up Marine, back to the lot,
  past the sunlighted streams,
  a close brush with wreck beach,
  up to the burrowing grove,
  zig zag through trees, cliffs, brambles
  back down burrowing grove,
  and the lot.
  hello lola.
]
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porous

After a deep freeze
I asked the ground
What does it feel like?
To be porous again
To feel the thawing water
Flow in
To be mushy and smelly
To hear things as other
Than muffled knocks

During the freeze
They say worms survive
By burrowing deep
In their own slime

I like to think about this

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