J. P. Sniadecki: Songhua

Artist(s):

• J. P. Sniadecki

Title:

Songhua

Exhibition:

• SIGGRAPH 2007: Global Eyes

Creation Year:

2007

Category:

• Interactive & Monitor-Based

Artist Statement:

This non-fiction video depicts the busy promenade and sandy banks of the Songhua River in the city of Harbin, China, as an urban sphere of ephemeral sociality and explores the complex relationship between the people of Harbin and their main water source. Through engaging the interface between anthropology and contemporary art, Songhua also addresses the possibility that image and sound can serve as a form of ethnographic research. Overall, through long takes of public space, intimate vignettes of film participants, and layers of ambient sound and cacophony, this digital work presents leisure and labor activities as they unfold within the social space of a popular yet fragile environment.

Technical Information:

All images and sounds were recorded on standard digital video with a Panasonic HD-P2 digital video camera and edited on a Final Cut Pro editing system in the Harvard Media Anthropology
Lab. The final audio design was digitally mastered on Soundtrack Pro.