"AGUA" (project description)
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Viewers will walk into an isolated black room within the gallery space to find themselves immersed in chaos of veils that will be hanging from the ceiling. Such veils have two functions; one is to represent the materiality of water, as if they were waterfalls or creeks. The other function is to provide a surface on which to project abstract images. The only light available is the one from the projections, which will be coming from different angles (see sketches for better understanding of the installation layout.) Ideally I will use three projectors for a space not bigger than a small classroom. The projected images will be dissolving as new images will replace the previous one, and they will be changing at different times in every different projector, just as individual ice crystals from the glaciers transcend their original form and their original location randomly until they rip apart from the icy body to become one with the body of water and start the long journey to an unknown destination. The imagery, although its abstract nature, it will represent different elements, such as ice, water, earth, vegetation, and humanity. Speakers will be placed in different locations within the space to bring about sound of the different elements represented with the imagery.
"Agua" (Download proposal in pdf form)
"BHAE" (project description)
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Viewers will walk into an isolated black room within the gallery to find themselves being the conjunctional element between two video projections lasting 7 minutes and 30 seconds each, since the sum of both is 15 minutes, the time limit for any video submitted to this exhibition (another conjunctional element). The over-head projectors will be placed opposed to each other, but not necessarily face-to-face. The viewer will not be alone in this gallery space; in conjunction with the viewer there will be several white veils of see-through fabric hanging from the ceiling that represent water. The veils will be aligned parallel but irregularly, just as water is organically located all over the planet. Water comes down from the sky -in different forms- onto the earth forming glaciers, rivers, lakes, oceans, and every other body of water. Water is also the conjunction between heaven and earth. The only light available is the one from the projections reflected and passing through the white veils (see sketches for better understanding of the installation layout.) There will be no sound as part of this 2-channel video installation because the human element will be there in conjunction to the imagery to provide human sounds.
"BHAE" (Download proposal in pdf form)
TEVA Life Agent Dream Grant submission
MFA Show Invitation
Decoding Secrets from White Giants (excerpt 1)
Decoding Secrets from White Giants (excerpt 2)
Decoding Secrets from White Giants (excerpt 3)
Decoding Secrets from White Giants (excerpt 4)
Decoding Secrets from White Giants (Draft)
Decoding Secrets From White Giants (Draft) from alexandro rojas sanders on Vimeo.
*******"Agua" (projected for 2009)
"Tousands have lived without love,
not one has lived without water"
-W.H. Auden
"Between Heaven and Earth - What's Left Behind" (projected for 2009)
This is a variation of "Agua". The main physical difference is the medium, since "Between Heaven and Earth - What's Left Behind" uses digital video as the source for imagery, instead of digital photography. The latter one also differs from the former one in that it uses two projectors instead of three. Also, it is designed for a smaller gallery space, therefore it uses less material, and is more affordable. However, conceptually "Between Heaven and Earth - What's Left Behind" has different reasoning. Please review the Critical Content, Concept, and Project Description to understand the differences.
These are the diagrams for "Between Heaven and Earth - What's Left Behind":
Testing fabrics for the installation (video clip)
MFA Installation Test1 from alex rojas sanders on Vimeo.
Time Lapse of a Glacier
The time lapse of this video was shot over four months at Saint Mary's Glacier, Colorado.
"AGUA" (concept)
CONCEPT
I want to project photographs of extraordinary abstract beauty onto strips of white, see-through material inside an isolated space surrounded by black walls, ceiling, and floor. Such cloth strips represent waterfalls and rivers passing by while we cannot do anything to prevent them form running down the hill and leaving us behind, dry. Abstract imagery and a dark space represent the sublime power and the mysterious dark side of nature. Mother earth is the womb, the life provider. Such womb is dark, but inside that womb is not pitch dark, some light infiltrates through its walls. Life within is sustained in water, and water itself is life. Light is energy, and energy is life, thus, as water sustains life, it absorbs light, it absorbs life, and then it gives life right back. Life within the womb is not noiseless; sounds pass through the womb’s walls and through the water as vibrations. Thus, as the viewer enters the installation within the gallery, s/he will create movement (vibrations) as s/he moves through the space and among the white, see-through veils that hold abstract images of water and ice in form of light.
"AGUA" (critical content)
CRITICAL CONTENT
Human’s relationship with glaciers is bounded deeper than what we can think while living within the accelerated rhythm of urban and suburban worlds. With this project I want to explore and celebrate the magnificence of glaciers, which are amongst the most beautiful wonders on this planet, by making a multi-channel photographic projection installation about the relationship between glaciers and humans. We do not have to go very far to find such relationship, since Coloradoans receive about two thirds of their fresh water from the glaciers that live among the Rocky Mountains.
This project is to create awareness of the vulnerability of these glaciers, and their importance in our everyday lives. All of the glaciers of Colorado are shrinking rapidly and soon they will be gone, and with them, one of our most precious resources, fresh water.
Abstract imagery, audio, and other media will show how glaciers give life by providing us with fresh water here in Colorado. Without glaciers we would have no irrigation water neither for their crops, nor for livestock, nor for ourselves to drink for the major part of the year --once the winter snows are gone. In addition, many animal and plant species on which we depend, such as vegetables and legumes, also depend on the water provided by these glaciers.
"BHAE" (concept)
Between heaven and earth ice have existed in cycles that last for hundreds of thousands of years at a time. Such ice has had an important role in the sustainability of life in the planet. Between heaven and earth we, humans, stand on top of every living species as if we were the corner stone of life in the planet, the conjunctional element. In this video installation, humans will stand in between two video projections facing each other to create such conjunctional element.
"BHAE" (critical content)
CRITICAL CONTENT
With this project I want to explore the conjunction that happens between heaven and earth when the relationship between humans and glaciers is being troubled. Human’s relationship with glaciers is bounded deeper than what we can think while living within the accelerated rhythm of urban and suburban worlds, and I see this relationship closely related to the concept of conjunction, which is the theme of this year’s Exhibition. Glaciers are amongst the most beautiful wonders on this planet, and their importance to life goes way beyond our common knowledge. We do not have to go very far to find such conjunction, since Coloradoans receive about two thirds of their fresh water from the glaciers that live among the Rocky Mountains.
The imagery of these videos will show, in one hand, the abstract beauty that lays now in the surface, now in the depths of the ice, the water, and the earth. On the other hand –the other video- will show the harshness of the damage caused by human activities on the atmosphere, on the water-reservoirs, and on the land.