Right around the Solstice last summer, I asked everyone in the building where I live and work to expose a pinhole camera from their windows for ninety days for the Pinhole Project. The idea was to expose all the cameras from each studio in the building, leaving the cameras up from the Solstice to the Equinox. The cameras recorded amazing trails of the sun all summer and into the fall. The views are recognizable, at least for those of us who are here every day and tended the cameras through the heat of last summer. The colors are mysterious and varied. I thank my colleagues, friends, fellow artists, neighbors all who participated. I did not know, until we did this, how beautiful our neighborhood actually is or much the sun shines on us or how the freeway is just a little toy off in the distance. I also did not know you can see the light of the sun trails to north and the south as well as east and west.
The building where I live and work is an artist’s coop. We own the building together, 20 units in all and I have always loved the views, from all sides of the building. I wanted to capture them with the long exposure pinhole cameras, hoping this was a good idea, but during the ninety days, I worried that the images might come out all the same. the views, the sun trails, the colors and the group as a whole would be boring. Scanning completely proved me wrong. The thirty images which I have uploaded here are titled with the name/unit number of the pinhole photographer. The grid, as it appears below, echoes how the printed images were hung in my studio last weekend. Below the grid are all the images which can be viewed individually. The building sits up against I-5 in the SoDo area of Seattle right before the Spokane Street interchange. The front of the building faces due west, the back east, a few units have south windows, and all the units that face north have windows in that direction. The featured image shows a pinhole image of the building that I made last spring. It is a 30 day exposure and shows the building’s west side. You can see the sun trails from the east above the building and the sun trails from the west reflected in the front windows.
The 30 images were featured at the Open Studios at out building this past November 15th. They are still up on my studio wall and will be up until Christmas time. Another opening will happen early in December. Stay tuned for dates and times and thanks for your continued support of the Pinhole Project.
