Living Data:
Relationship

2017 Conversations

Disclaimers, Copyrights and Citations

Conversations/Index 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024

"Few will doubt that humankind has created a planet-sized problem for itself.
No one wished it so, but we are the first species to become a geophysical force,
altering Earth's climate, a role previously reserved for tectonics, sun flares, and glacial cycles."
E. O. Wilson, 1998. Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge
p. 277-278

The primal attraction of light painting

Saturday 19th August 2017.

Master Light Painter Peter Solnessgives a workshop at the Chrissie Cotter Gallery in Camperdown, Sydney. Before the workshop starts, I talk with Peter about the origins of light painting and its continuing attraction to story tellers through the ages.

TRANSCRIPT

Jason Middleweek:

Come in.

Peter Solness (PS):

Here's to light painting. I love light painting.

Lisa Roberts (LR):

What's light painting?

PS:

What's light painting? Well it's about putting a torch on something. You've got to turn the light out. You take all the light away and you add light gradually. So light painting is using a torch like a paint brush. So when this torch here becomes like a paint brush to apply light to something, it becomes light painting.

LR:

For some reason I'm thinking of some ancient conversation in a cave.

PS:

Ah, yeah, right. Probably the firelight, firelight in a cave. You had fire in a cave, you'd see the shadows of people in the cave. The fire is light-painting the cave with this beautiful warm light. So in a way we're familiar with - we all experienced light painting in our ancestry, in terms of the atmosphere of light at night time, the atmosphere of light when ... in light painting you get a similar experience, it's got this sort of aura to it.

LR:

So it's quite primal.

PS:

Yeah. It is. That's why I like it.