Sally Cloninger

I certainly know the difficulties of working on more than one project. And I warn everyone about this all the time but of course sometimes I cannot afford to take my own good advice. The Evergreen Visual History Archive project is a huge endeavor. We finally got a very sketchy test site up and I just posted a video excerpt from one of the many ongoing projects I am involved with this year. If you are so inclined, take a look. Of added value I am seen zipping Evergreen faculty out to Squaxin Island in my boat!

Navigate to EVHA test site via my links and go to Video Tests.

Okay, I have empathy. I do. As of yesterday I finally let go of the concept for Red Rocks. No more Taos in the 20s. No more Frida and DH Lawrence. No more Brett. No more Mabel. The actual red rocks are still in it. The faked home movies too I think. But good-bye to the intellectual/literary premise that everyone loved but I couldn’t budge further than a 2 minute trailer.

Well, I intend to spend time this week trying to pull together a better description of my experimental film. I don’t want to characterize it by what it isn’t i.e., it isn’t a fictional memoir. It will involve my personal archives, my fascination with time, my interest in the landscape, my willingness to play. (Aside: I got a gift from Lynda that was prescient; I will share that with you in another post). I am “starting over in the same place” which coincidentally was the name of an installation that I made with Marilyn Frasca and Mark Levensky about 15 years ago (I think). The first film I made when I joined the faculty at Evergreen was called Personal Landscapes. Soon after that I made Going to My House, probably my biggest transition as a filmmaker (it also was my first collaboration with Peter). I am returning to the spirit if not the content of these early works. Well, enough for now. I also redid my website this morning. All evidence removed of my current work. No regrets.

If you are interested in the history of the project, you can find lots of information at the EVHA link in the blogroll You can even find the original grant proposal to the Evergreen Fund for Innovation (which might be of interest to folks writing proposals). You also can see who is collaborating on the project, what kinds of Evergreen materials are the focus for this year, and what we are up to in general. I will post a sample video of a short project called, Drawing from the Landscape soon on my video page.

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