Murdim Project

Consisting of several 20-minute organic waterfall like totem pole murals echoing the sounds of the crowded streets of Paris. They range between 2 and 7 meters high of moving images that are always the same and yet always different. It allows viewers to see at the same time thousands of people all together, and one by one as they come closer. http://www.murdim.com/earth.html The images have a meaning when you see them from afar but not necessarily the same meaning seen close up and personal. It also allows you to think of images in terms of not being part of a “movie”. For instance, like every day life in Paris, with similarities to Vertov’s “Man with a Movie Camera, the murdim Project also captures everyday scenes from daily life in a city. Only these images are not part of a typical “movie” in that you do not have to sit to look at. These are in fact images that go far beyond the usual A3, 16 x 9 and other 1080 sizes. Or, even to think of images that go further than kaleidoscopic computer graphics. 10 to 20 HDV cameras on each totem. Totems are stitched together and broadcast on LCD screens, with each camera aiming at a different part of the scene the same way one would shoot in panoramic photography

Jacques Davis, the artist behind murdim Project uses crowds and nature as his subjects. Living and working in Paris, France, Davis worked for 35 years as a photographer doing mostly large slide shows, later with video, and video walls. Be it swimming pools, demonstrations, political meetings, markets, and other gatherings as his subjects for the camera, crowds are the main focus. To view the crowds from afar as a totem, the viewer sees the strength, will and force of a crowd while at the same time one can see close-ups of thousands of very individually unique people.

To view go to http://www.rhizome.org/editorial/2447