“Manhatta” simply began by noticing the light of the morning sun shining into the office where I work. It lead me to looking out the window and capturing the light as it reflected on the city below. My work at my job is routine. Capturing the changing mood of light day to day is not. Nothing is like the day before. Tomorrow is not like today. You get it, or you don’t. Chance is no chance. I am there as a witness, to feel it, or I am absent.
Two artists back in 1921, Paul Strand, a photographer, and Charles Sheeler, a painter who used photographs as the basis for his paintings, choose to film the great city in which they lived. This film, a homage, “Manhatta”, is considered the first American avant-garde film to be made. My rediscovery of the film early in this series, gave me impetus to continue.
I confined myself to the limitations of the views outside my office windows high up on 5th Avenue and 34th Street. Occaissionally, when the opportunity presented itself, I would document from street level below.
