5 Day Art Challenge
February 12, 2015
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The 5 Day Art Challenge is an upscale, Facebook version of the old-fashioned chain letter. One artist nominates another artist to produce or highlight 3 pieces of their own artwork each day over the course of 5 days. Then that artist nominates another artist, presumably a new one on each of the 5 days. And so it continues, starting from some unknown creative quark unfolding into an ever-expanding universe of artists. I have no idea where this challenge started and its rules are somewhat variable. But I did take the challenge as an opportunity to review some of the photographic projects I have undertaken over the past few decades. I found it instructional to review how I have evolved over the years and thought my blog followers might likewise be interested in this fragmented autobiography of their blogger.
What follows is the diary of my Facebook posts, the first of 5 consecutive posts appearing on February 6, 2015.
Day 1
I thought I would start off quietly with three images from an unfinished series on Manitoba's quickly disappearing grain elevators. I started the series about 2000. These three are vacant elevators, likely gone by now. Ilford XP2 chromogenic BW 35mm film, scanned. If I recall correctly, this is the last work I did with a film camera.
Day 2
This is my Archambault Pavilion in Transcona. It’s termed a public art project (I won the commission through a Winnipeg Arts Council public art proposal call) but it is art with a definite functional requirement as an outdoor stage. Public art projects are demanding and complex, not for the feint-of-heart. I pursue them because they allow me to explore photography as a sculptural element and use it to create space. My public art projects are more fully presented on my website (see the Public Art tab above).
Day 3
Lately, I have been concentrating on small things. Dogs. Strolls. iPhone photography. And small books.
Here are three books created using Blurb books, a print-on-demand self-publishing platform. The first title, “Three days walking”, was published in 2010 as a test piece based on a series of large-scale canvas prints first exhibited at Martha Street studios. The other two are smaller 7" x 7" books, both published last year: “A Dérive to the Airport” and “Walking Styxx: a month of psychogeographic walks with a greyhound”. I particularly like these small books as a tiny, affordable way to present an entire project.
If you would like to view the pages of any of these books, go to my Blurb bookstore at http://www.blurb.ca/user/store/davidfirman Feel free to buy one while you're there!
Day 4
This is a set of photos taken one night on a walk through the Exchange District in Winnipeg. It’s part of my Atlas of Reveries series that follows various sunrise and sunset walks through urban environments. A "map" charts each journey but the images themselves are more dreamlike responses to the path taken. Other walks from this series can be viewed at http://www.firmangallery.com/atlas-of-reveries My plan is to revisit this project, improve the maps, add a few more walks that never got finished and put them in a small Blurb book. Stay tuned.
Day 5
This is a series of pictures taken during a 2008 walk through Kensington Market in Toronto. They are part of my expansive Walk Project, which is fully documented on my website at www.firmangallery.com/walk
Kensington Market carries special memories for me. In the mid-1960’s my dad would take me on trips to Kensington Market where we would pick up loaves of fresh egg bread and pots of soft cream cheese with chives to take back to our home in London. I can still recall the jostling crowds, the smells of the bakery, the taste of that cream cheese.
My dad died - very young - in 1969 and my mum, seeking support of family and friends, moved our family back to her roots in Manitoba. Mum and I are still happily ensconced in this province but, when visiting Toronto, Kensington Market is always on my itinerary. The little cream cheese shop is still there but the neighbourhood has otherwise continued to transform itself in new and wonderful ways. If anything, the neighbourhood is more diverse, the scents more aromatic, the hubbub more intense.
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