broadcast bob — a story from a former prisoner of war who got his start in broadcast during WWII

Today Canada remembers veterans of war. I spoke to my great uncle Bob about his experiences as a POW as well as his journey through a broadcasting career. This audio piece was used a few weeks ago in At Humber, our daily hour long current affairs show out of Humber College. The show is produced by final year journalism students at Humber and is broadcast on 96.9FM Radio Humber. Enjoy the story. Everyone should interview their elders about the past, there are so many stories out there.

Cheers

like jube jubes in light form

Wade Davis– remembering all culture – telling all stories

I have returned with an audio piece. Wade Davis’s Massey lecture will be broadcast tonight at 9pm (Monday Nov. 2nd 2009) on CBC radio one’s Ideas. I was able to interview him before his final Massey Lecture presentation in Toronto. He was able to give me a half-hour long interview.This is my little piece, produced today and aired on At Humber. I may end up producing a feature profile piece with this interview if I find the time.

memories from the Toronto Hospital for the Insane

Artwork from Nuit Blanche exhibition
“In SANITY”, The Story Behind The Wall
Presented by Workman Arts Project Ontario

This sculpture was done by Annalise and is based on the profile of Cynthia H. a patient who was held in the Toronto Asylum for the Insane from 1904 – 1909

All works were based on patient bios from Geoffrey Reaume’s book Remembrance of Patients Past.

Cynthia H.’s fallopian tubes, uterus and one ovary were removed while at the hospital. At the time doctors believed that a woman could be cured of ‘insanity’ by removing her reproductive organs.

All sculptural works at the exhibition reminded me of each individuals struggle but also identified them very specifically as personalities. Each work appeared as an homage to the person being depicted.

poster art–CONNECTION–biking Cuba

I am holding back the urge to begin this post with “walking down the dusty dirt roads of …”. It does seem that this cliché holds true for me when it comes to traveling in other countries. I am always, drawn to musty places and dirt while fumbling my way around a new country. I’m sure this is not uncommon amongst many travelers. There is something about a dry dirt road that eases ones body into unfamiliar surroundings. Relaxing.

So yes, I had completely convinced myself that the following particular memory took place on a dusty street in Trinidad, Cuba. Romanticizing was never an element of any agenda I may or may not have had in mind but that’s the way it happens sometimes. Through an Internet image search I decided to check up on my minds ability to replace one image for another and cobblestone streets is what I found.

Ahhhh yes, I DO remember it now because my bike was bumping along those obscurely tiled roads. My friend Todd and I had just arrived in Trinidad by bike. For most of our time in Cuba we’d been using bikes to get from one town to the next and eventually we found ourselves in the world heritage site of Trinidad; historical buildings with crumbling facades. The air of revolution having long faded away into the grain of concrete surfaces and patterns made by chipped paint.

We both locked up our bikes on a street that led right into a town square. On the barren shelves of a convenience store we managed to find our daily staple, a little bread and a little cheese. This was not a tourist shop and the ritzy enclaves found in Havana for those ‘doing Cuba’ on a package were nowhere to be seen. As travelers we agree to pay double the cost with our Cuban dollars. In Cuba there are two currencies and tourists are only allowed to use one, which is worth more. The number on the price tag remained the same no matter what.

Ambling along I spot a gorgeous poster on the back wall of an unassuming but large store. I drag Tod in.

There are stacks and stacks of posters made during and after the revolution. These ones were all for movies. I wanted to buy ten but knew it was only practical to purchase two of my favorites. I settled upon a poster for a Cuban documentary called Rita designed by René Azcuy and a poster for Cuban movie Retrato de Teresa. The design for this movie was, according to the Center for Cuban Studies in New York, the only poster done by Cuban artist Servando Cabrera Moreno. The chalky feel of each poster suggested that it could have been printed with gauche. Graphic flattened out colour popped out of each surface delighting the eye through each intriguing design.

I left with two little pieces of history rolled up carefully, protected by a flimsy plastic bag and strapped down to my bicycle. Both are now mounted and hopefully preserved for sometime to come. Every time I look at them I only wish I could have collected a few more prints. But I know that many other stories are sure to gather with each discovery and each meander through that shop.

biking just outside of Trinidad

beautiful blur

one more photo. memory post to come soon soon soon.

macro

taken at the McMichael on a trail outside of Toronto.

canon ae-1 & darkrooms –CONNECTION– first photography expeditions

The digital age seems to be making photography less guided and purposeful. Competition is higher than ever and this competition in many cases serves as a distraction to quality. The pressure is on all photographers to produce at alarmingly unhealthy rates. But the real photographers amongst us are out there with their digital flickr accounts and many of them still use film. Some of them only use film.

In the past year, out of necessity, I’ve begun working within the digital photographic realm. Honing my skills in Photoshop engulfed by the overwhelming amount of possibilities it offers (batch file processing being one unexpected option). Often I find there is too much to learn and time is eaten away much too easily. At this moment I return a longing gaze towards my Canon AE-1 sitting on its, all too often, dusty shelf.

$$$ makes me step back from my first love, but I know there is nothing like the breathtaking quality of film grain. As advanced as digital cameras have become in the past few years zeros and ones do not add up to the pop of a 35mm filmstrip.

A second hand Canon AE-1 was my first camera, received as a birthday gift during my early high school years. Its metal body has since been dropped on cement sidewalks but continues to click along as smooth as ever. Who knows where the value of this glorious relic will go in the next few decades. I know for sure there’s nothing that will break it down. No additional software needed to update insignificant file formats. Just a simple cleaning will do.

My father introduced me to photography and my first camera, having dabbled in it during his university days. My first few photographic expeditions included walks along the edge of Stuart Lake (located in central BC) recapturing the experience with light stains. Within a few years boxes containing darkroom equipment were pulled out and set up in a small triangle shaped room. Chemicals and a red light were paid for. Blankets were draped over the door and stuffed under it blocking out white light.

Darkrooms are missed. Embedded in a memory box labeled nostalgia and longing. Colour darkrooms are especially exciting with the added challenge of balancing colours through a box of light. It was the only place in which a sense of solitude and complete focus were given even with people milling about. One can choose community and connection amongst rows of enlargers and then retreat back into an individual world of light stains on paper.

Taken by flickr user (joel). One of my favorite photostreams.

Lovely pet portrait by flickr user Caleb Alvarado. No cheesyness here. Taken with a Mamiya RZ67 Pro II

Ruminating on the direction of photography I have often convinced myself that the demise of film is not too far away. Upon joining the popular online photo site flickr I am now convinced of the opposite. Many on this site are so dedicated to film that it is all they will use but then again most who take this approach to photography are in their 20s or older.

Am I among the last generation of film users? This notion seems all too romantic and strangely comforting. Still I think the charm of older cameras, especially large and medium format ones will draw in young artists interested in trinkets from the past (the typewriter is still kicking around amongst those communities).

A couple weeks ago I dropped off a stack of film to be scanned and converted into digital files. I had a long conversation with the owner of the photo processing shop. He helped me understand the different file types and how to best process RAW photo files. He also explained how lucky I was to learn on film because I could understand the basics. I could read light without having any tools telling me how to read it. I knew what f-stop, ISO and ASA stood for. I knew how aperture and film speed worked. Some recent photography graduates don’t even know some of these things. I was shocked when he told me of a young graduate of a photography diploma program. She had never worked with any medium other than digital and didn’t know what ISO stood for (film speed) what was worse was that using aperture controls was not even on her radar. She didn’t know what aperture was and was only using the shutter speed to control how much light was coming into the camera (this is a severely limiting way of capturing an image and can stop a camera from recording the necessary detail … unless that’s not what you’re going for).

Photoshop and Lightroom seem to be the cutting edge tools to be an expert of and cameras only a necessary aspect for framing the image. After all, lighting and colour balance can all be processed after the fact, in most instances without damaging the original digital file.

I am not reluctant to be joining the ranks of digital processing lovers, but I remain wary. Every once in a while I plan to slip in a roll of film, listening carefully for the satisfactory clickity-clack of film edges catching onto plastic teeth pulling inside the camera. I am even beginning to drool over the idea of purchasing a medium format film camera in a few years. For now the LCD screen I have become all too reliant upon will remain off as, once again, I read light and manipulate it to my advantage.

Taken by flickr user sergio conde.

Recent photo by flickr user isa mar. Most, if not all photos are film.

cold souls – a review

Dr. Flintstein shows Paul his gallery of souls. Image Courtesy of Adam Bell, Samuel Goldwyn Films.

If you were able to temporarily lock up your soul safely in cold storage would you do it? It would be painlessly sucked out and placed in a cylindrical tube available to you at anytime if you should need it returned to its natural environment. Medical history has seen various methods in which soul destruction was a result and so soul extraction, the premise of Sophie Barthes debut film Cold Souls, is surreal but doesn’t seem that unbelievable.

Lead actor Paul Giamatti, plays him-self. He is struggling through his rehearsals of a Chekhov play and feeling miserable in the process. Upon the advice of a friend and after reading a New Yorker article on the subject he decides soul extraction may cure his angst.

Giamatti has some concerns but doesn’t seem too troubled by the soul extraction specialists’ nonchalant attitude to the procedure or to underground operations involving transportation of souls through a Russian mule. Dr. Flintstein, played by David Strathairn, is upfront about his operation still being in its experimental stages admitting that they don’t know much about its effects. After going through various procedures in Dr. Flintstein’s office, including renting a Russian poets soul, Giamatti finally ends up in Russia in search of his smuggled soul.

Paul looks precariously into the soul extractor. Image courtesy of Adam Bell. Samuel Goldwyn Films.

Cold Souls has been compared to Kaufman’s screenplay, Being John Malkovich, the link being the mythologizing of the actors’ soul and the surreal nature of both films. This connection is tenuous and only distracts from an individual analysis of the film. Cold Souls is romantic, fantastical and concrete in its approach while Kaufman’s films are darker and delve into the conceptual a little more.

Barthes, has an intriguing concept in this film. What would happen if we could extract and rent souls? The idea is full of creative potential but the scenes connect together in a wistful meandering that makes the movie feel both too long and a little detached from the subject matter, which is much heavier. It is also the lack of attention to detail that really catches you off-guard. Why was Nina, the Russian mule played by Dina Korzun, so willing to help Giamatti get his soul when it could surely get her in serious trouble with her shady boss? How was it physically implausible for Nina to get her soul back on account of the conglomeration of soul remnants within her WHEN she had been transporting entire Russian souls to the US? Also, how was she the only mule servicing the private New York clinic? All these questions and more pulled me out of the plot.

Despite these annoyances the performances are solid and Giamatti is an expert in his subtle comic approach. There were some wonderfully funny scenes; my favorite being when Giamatti discovers his soul looks just like a chickpea. This is followed by his soul accidentally being tossed across Dr. Flintstein’s office leaving both of them desperately fumbling around to find it.

harbord and bathurst