P.U.L.S.

This project is an extension on my Smoke & Mirrors series from the beginning of 2012. Utilizing a multitude of camera systems including a FLIR infrared, 3D video , DSLR, and lenticular images I have attempted an address of this paradox of Urban Heat Island. Creating shifting, user-activated photographs, infrared video tours of the city, and stop motion light studies, this work redefines the spaces of the downtown Phoenix Metro area through scientific tools used artistically. The FLIR depicts heat signatures in real time, while the stop motion animations contract one day of reflected urban light into seconds of rapid solar movement. Lenticular imaging is applied as a method to create a shifting picture of weather pattern change.Artists Statement

If you look at a map of Phoenix, it resembles a torso of a human. The highways and streets could stand in for nerves and vessels. The 101 interstate creates the frame of the ribs, while highways 17 and 51 section off a left and right side of the body. In the belly of this beast is downtown Phoenix, and if you gut it and empty the contents you will find what we consume….the pedestrian and the natural environment. The effects of Urban Heat Island are magnified in this area due to urban planning decisions, politics, and a general disassociation with what the surrounding communities want for their city. As light reflects from the steel and mirrored glass all day it chases people through the streets and into the shadows obliterating the only source of shelter . The light turns to heat and starts the cycle of increasing the temperature of the environment and its urban elements of pavement, glass, steel, and concrete. The cycle does not contain a renewal process since the elements never fully reset to normal temperatures; they gradually escalate the temperature of each other. The roads guide people through this space and it frequently feels like a test of endurance to pass through these areas in the debt of summer. The pulse of the city is immeasurable as cultural shifts sway to politics, weather, and the disconnection of communities that are only intertwined through the streets. The network of roads, paths, streets, freeways, and interstates connect all the separate membranes of the valley into one environment with the most common factor being heat.

Also published on the Phoenix Transect website.