BEACON  2003  (Street lamps from Studio) STUDIO BLOCK SERIES

Beacon is one of the first works I made in my current studio in East London. I had worked for several years without a real studio working on site in various projects worldwide. My studio was the foyer of a museum, a temporary studio on site. In fact just a few weeks ago I had a temporary studio for a month in NYC in the Lower Eastside by the Bowery. My studio is also various cafes and bars, I write constantly in a different notebooks I usually have three of four on the go and in a way these notebooks are my studio also.

In 2003 I moved in a new studio in East London a few minutes from my house. I was not sure what to do in this space at first. So I began the process I always employ in my notebooks and start to map where I am.  I documented the space, using drawings measurement and recorded the space with sounds recording and video.

I called this series of works  - Studio Block and I still continue the project today. I filmed leaks in the roof the toilets the corridors, lights that where flickering and various acts within the space. I have a view of the main dual carriage way between Bow and Stratford and I began to notice at dusk, that the street lights came on in the same order each night, I began to draw and notate the times and the order which they would light up. Then I decided to film each moment of ignition. So over a few days I was able to point the camera at the lamp a few minutes before they lights came on. I knew that I wanted the ignition to be accompanied by a sound and the original idea was that it would be a voice. In the end I chose to manipulate a chord on the electric piano. The sound on this version is the second sound version. Each screen as one note, together make a chord.