Ian Bennett I Thought Bubbles
Art and Videos and Travel and Fun from Ian Bennett
Several years ago an image was engrained in my brain. I was in the back of a car driving along a highway in Manila, and we were going over a river when I saw the smog-ghost outlines of Manila’s skyscrapers towering over the squatters’ make-shift shacks which stretched out into the river. It was such an illustration of the contrast between the rich and the poor, and it was an image I did not have the time to capture. The next time I was in Manila, I decided, I would find it again and photograph it.
I have since returned to Manila for a weekend, so instead of hanging out at one of the largest malls in the world I set out to Pasig River to finally capture what had been burned in my mind.
Of course I didn’t find it. Who knows if I looked at the wrong parts of the river or if my mind exaggerated what I saw over the years beyond the actual sight. No, walking along the river I didn’t find the riches of the malls or the skyscrapers. What I found was even better. It was in the laughs and the basketball games and the babies and the smiles and everyone who wanted a photo. This time I hadn’t simply seen a view of a river from the highway, I had actually walked along the river.
Right at the end, right before my friend and I had to leave in order to catch our flight, I saw something very close to what I had originally been looking for, where the river itself traces the path from the murky depths to the riches in the sky.
When I got back home I decided to sit down and instead of looking for the image, to draw it out.
The “12 year old’s version” as my other friend described it:
And just for kicks, I played around with the one photo a little bit:
The whole process got me thinking. Have a goal — have some out of reach abstract destination to reach, and see where it takes me.
Tags: art, blog videos, manila, pasig, pasig river, philippines, photos, skyscrapers, videos
Very nice site!
Very nice site!