Monat: Mai 2012

Cowgirl Coincidence

Sometimes it just happens like that …. I checked the internet for some vintage shops that sell cowboy boots, went to the closest one today (Madam Vintage, 168 Gladstone Ave) and I fell in love with them at first sight … my new cowboy boots!
Thank you, it was lovely to meet you, Cara 🙂 and say hello to your Mom in Alberta!!

10 Active Ingredients

I of course have at least 10 active ingredients but I didn’t know that „slimming patches“ have it, too!
I’ve never even heard about such a thing ….. it says „Simply apply 1 diet patch each day to a clean, dry, hair free part of your body, forget about it and watch the weight come off.“
So what’s inside? Radioactive uranium that makes you immediately forget about your weight? Skunk essence that makes you puke all day long?
[10 minutes internet research says: „ocean kelp called bladderwrack“]. At least the word makes me less hungry …

Bad Beer

Only one beer can ruin your life!
I mean not alcoholic-wise, we know how to handle that, even 3 glasses of wine or 5 glasses of yummy beer, depends on your own personal circumstances and joy and discipline … but what I really despise is when your local government intervenes and treats you like children … like here in Ontario … going to your favourite health store and buy a nice bottle of organic white wine for your dinner? No way, go to controlled LCBO stores.
Enjoy experimental films together with a nasty glass of white wine at Capitol Cinema in Windsor? Bar closes at 7 pm, haha.
Now I see people with transportable coffee mugs late in the evening in a different way … not coffee kept warm, wine or beer kept cold!!
After filmshow at Phog bar you can have it all, ok, but better DARE NOT cross the imaginary border between bar and public street and have a sip outside the safe universe: some bar guy or lady will surely appear in 1 second and lead you back inside to a better lifestyle!
Imagine that. Italians drink 1 glass of white wine to their lunch. At daylight. Just for the fun. Just for the taste. For the culture and cuisine. Without being wacky alcoholics.
(I just don’t like being controlled to the bone.)

GM Chocolate

Mmmh, this is Hersheys yummiest white chocolate with little black cookies inside … unfortunately it contains a variety of ingrediens that are genetically modified (sugar, corn …)
Did you know? Eighty percent of all soybeans and 70 percent of all cotton now grown in the U.S. are genetically engineered. So is 38 percent of all corn. Corn and soy turn up in processed foods as oils.
Mmmmmh!!

Sun Spiral

Developing black&white reversal film you need to expose it to light a second time in between the developing baths. Normally hold it 2 minutes against a 100 W bulb (see the film is in a transparent spiral!), but I thought: why not take the Canadian summer sun while it’s on?! It works!

Chicken Momo

Walking along the street in plain sunshine, feeling slightly hungry, being dragged just by coincidence into an inconspicuous little restaurant called Tibet Café, I ordered chicken momo just because I liked the name.
The smiling lady said: wait 15 minutes and so I did.
It smelled good there. They have a large image of the Dalai Lama, also smiling. I watched out the window: we’re open. Slow beautiful streetcar. Someone crossing the street. Sunshimmer. I have time. I exist. This is it. I understand the sense of it all.

Ambassadors Of Coincidence

It’s a game.

We played and documented it today and yesterday.
It goes like this:
A city walk game. Limit: one city, two days.
A group of 2 or 3 people.

We chose a starting point by chance (dice, telephone book) which is a street and a number. We go there, our antennas upright, find something, any item possible, any stranded goods, doodle, debris, paint, house, plant, sign, scene, mark that gives away its secret and inspires us to find the next station. We derive information from it, meaning: next street-name and number. And so on.

We tempt fate and challenge coincidence. We go with the flow, confident that the mighty spirit of coincidence will give us signs and that we, the flexible and witty artists, will be able to interpret them, capture them and find our unique personal path until the game comes to a logic end.

This game is not objective. Our personality, our view and our history colorizes the whole experiment and makes it a singular happening, an irrepeatable film. There can be beauty in banality and weÂ’ll find it.

We film and record sounds and document the trip as a whole, the magic points as individual signs, what we see, what we get, what we think Â… it can lead us to surprises, to weird stories or boredom. It depends on us. And a little on the weather. Super 8 helps make a jewel out of it!

There will be a website soon.
And a film. Give me some time 🙂

Baseball, S8-John & Big Fat Burrito

I met John Porter, Toronto’s most famous super 8 filmer, we bought some yummy burritos at Kensington Market („Big Fat Burrito“) and opened the baseball season at Christie Pits (famous for its riots 80 years ago), beautiful green open park, Toronto Maple Leafs against Ottawa Fat Cats. We won!

My first baseball game! Haven’t got a clue why guys were standing at different posts doing nothing while the boy in the middle kept bombing tiny balls towards another one who constantly missed it with his bat …. but it was fun to watch and John brought ice cold cider 😉

Coffee Countdown Film

How did this silly film idea come upon me … I want to make a short film, Kodachrome K40, and then process it in caffenol, see if it works … about Toronto and coffee of course, something speedy, most probably called „Toronto, I like you as much as I like coffee“ using letters that I find around here … so I thought it would be nice to start it with a countdown, spent half my day chasing numbers from 10 down to 0 which is not easy because numbers tend to come in company: they have another number left or right, especially a 4 was veeeery hard to find …

But anyway, the sun was shining brightly, summer has come into town, butterflies land on my legs!!

Street Snake

Me in Toronto … having plenty of time wandering Eastwest and Northsouth and zigzagish, inhaling fresh impressions and finding pictures at every corner and … look there: a snake sign on the ground! It’s a metaphor for me, meaning …. wisdom and a winding path to go!!