Dancer, During Filming at Dry Falls, Eastern Washington

I was running the video camera for my friend Diana who is making a film of her dance students for UW. Also did some photos of the dancers and the surrounding area.

They were first rolling around in the dust of this desert area, so that is why the clothes look a bit distressed. I will post more of these. They were all done in Dry Falls, Eastern Washington.

Note: Yes, that is the original background. We used a trampoline!

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Kissenschlacht (Pillow Fight)

Last week I went to the Northwest Film Forum's Wiggly World, a production facility for film people in Seattle, to use a 16mm editing table. I needed to look at a copy print of a 16mm movie I made 21 years ago. It was a little bit exiting. I did not use an editing table for nine years or since I live in America. In the 80s, I was very interested in experimental movies and created several myself which were shown at German and international Festivals.



This is a long time ago, and I gave up on film making for several reasons, so it was a surprise when I received a letter from Annette Brauerhoch from the University of Paderborn. She is a professor for film science and is putting together an archive and collection of experimental short movies by women filmmakers in Germany and wanted to include my movie in the selection. She saw one of my films - Kissenschlacht - 20 years ago on a festival and has it still in strong memory. I was surprised and touched and honored.

Interesting to look at the movie again: to see if the ideas I had twenty years ago are still of value or maybe just ridiculous. At that time, I was intrigued by newspaper pictures of politicians. I worked on that for my study at the University and analyzed body postures and structures of these photos. This went into a little 16 minute long movie . I "animated" these pictures and combined them with pictures I filmed of my sleeping boyfriend all aiming for one continuous movement. I was happy with the way it came out, although some may find it boring to look at a sleeping man and not much is happening.

At that time the movie was quite well perceived. It was accepted on festivals and often written about it:

"A masterpiece of the experimental storytelling . . . Ingrid Pape confirms with this calm and wordless study the 'sovereign' preciseness and musicality of her filmmaking."

- German film kritic Michael Koetz writing in the Frankfurter Rundschau, 1986.

While that was nice to read, the question is: Do I still understand and stand by what I did 21 years ago?

What I realize now is that very likely my intense studying of these pictures gave me a good base for my photography. My understanding of body postures in photographs, film and life goes into my work now.

The other thing that's satisfying to know is that the film will light up on a big screen again, projected from a celluloid film, will be shown to students and film scientists and not just sit in a dark box. It is still alive and not just a "sin of youth".

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Cover Shot: Lynne Barker and Lucia Athens

Here is the new Seattle Woman Magazine cover for April.



This photo shoot felt like a little adventure. Lynne Barker and Lucia Athens are both from the Green Building Program of the Seattle Department of Planning and Development. I did not have a chance to meet them before. When I waited for them at the City Hall, two woman walked towards me, looking at me. Then one said, "Are you Ingrid" and I realized these were Lucia and Lynne. Somehow I expected some 'outdoor' types. We laughed and Lynn said "Did we not fit your stereotype?" A little bit true.

We decided City Hall did not really work for the shoot and Lynne suggested the Municipal Court building on the other side of the street. It had a beautiful green opaque wall installation with water in front of it. This gave me a boost of energy.



I loved the green wall with Lucia and Lynne outfits. The black was great and the silver geometrical jewelry corresponded to the metal elements in the wall design. But it was hard to get it all to work. The sun was extreme, there was wind which blew over my reflector stand, the time was limited - this was Lucia and Lynne's lunch break - no assistant to hold the reflector, and the space with the pool in front did not seem to have "easy" spots for them to be. But in the end it all worked out: Lucia and Lynn were up to everything and had a lot of fun, a young man who worked in the building helped hold the reflector, we found the 'perfect' spot to stand, and the clouds showed just in the right moment, to cover the merciless early afternoon sun.

This is what I love about the shoots: in the beginning you have all these elements they are disparate and problematic and then, after just jumping in with trust and the willingness to bear it, all falls into place.

. . . . . . .

You can also download the whole April issue here, but only for a while. It’s available in print form at many locations around Seattle, of course, and many of the their past articles are available for reading in text form from their site as well.

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Blossoms

Last Monday, I walked to a music performance around 7.15pm on NW 65th street. I love the "Blue Hour", when the sky is darkening but still blue, and the warm yellow lights on the streets and in the windows lighten up. At the Ballard High School, there were some trees in a line full in bloom. It was already quite dark but the blossoms glowed by themselves. The affluence of the blossoms was kind of overwhelming. Walking under them feels like being in a fairy tale. Beauty freely given.

I stopped and took out my camera, in a shy try to "recreate" ("capturing" would be futile here) something that might come close to my perception.







Then I went to the performance of Tuning The Air, which is happening each Monday for several month again. It was beautiful. Jaxie (one of the guitar players) asked me after the performance how it was. I tried to put it into words. "It was strong", was one of the things I said. Walking back through the dark street and the cold air, my words were continuing to do their own thing in my head and developing further what I wanted to express about the music. "It was strong in being gentle and gentle in being strong" came to my mind.

The next morning in waking up the blossoms and the trees appeared in my head and they connected with the music of last night and it hit me. They kind of belonged together, there was something very similar about both of them: being subtle and gentle in the detail and powerful at the same time.

So hard to do, but sometimes it's there, just like a gift.


Spring is Here...

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