The Illuminated Thread

Definitions of the noun form of thread emphasize two qualities: thinness, and continuousness or length.  In fact, it is the widely disproportionate ratio between a thing’s width and length that allows it to be described as threadlike.  This autumn my colleague, Joseph Miller, and I will ride our bicycles 3200 miles from Chicago to the Pacific Coast.  The mostly intangible trail our tires leave behind will have a length nearly 200 million times that of its width—a thread in the truest sense of the word.

But thread carries another meaning that goes beyond physical attributes.  Threads run through situations or pieces of writing, connecting successive parts.  They are synonymous with themes or motifs and are typically twisted and bundled together like the fibers that comprise a piece of twine.  So may we again apply the word to our forthcoming journey?  What themes or plot lines will develop within our adventure and how will they serve the structure of a larger whole?

Besides the daily dramas of managing life on a bicycle (living out of tents, consuming enough calories to support eight daily hours of physical activity, et al) we’re going to be fully engaged in artistic production.  Joe and I received our MFA degrees from the University of Chicago in June.  We’ve been making art at full speed for the last two years and have no intention of slowing down.  We’re simply replacing the static surroundings of our studios with the dynamic context of an extended bicycle tour.  In other words:  we’re taking it on the road.  The ride’s primary thematic thread will be digesting a wide and ever-changing stream of fresh visual and conceptual material, then using it as fodder for new work.  In short, it will be a predominantly intellectual pursuit encapsulated by a physical one.

Video will be our medium of choice, mostly because it’s a language in which we both communicate, but also because it enables us to carry all the tools we need.  Because the bits of data being produced have virtually no mass, the digital format is perfect for a pursuit that demands keeping weight and volume to a minimum.  That said, we do not intend to limit ourselves exclusively to video and digital photography.  Following our artistic instincts, we may require the employment of other formats and techniques.  Furthermore, we’re making no presuppositions with regard to the length or brevity of the pieces produced en route.  Some may take the entire trip to complete; others may be fleeting, lasting only a few moments.  These pieces will be the fibers that accumulate into the larger project-- the thread itself.

This is a deliberately loose structure.  We view establishing more rigid project parameters as a mistake.  Although the traveling artists’ convention of applying a singular question or activity to unfamiliar territory may yield interesting results, we believe the approach is outdated.  It is impossible to know in advance what an as-yet-unexperienced time or place might demand of an artist, so it would be naïve to devise an equation in which every stop along the way is a variable, easily plugged in.  Instead, we will open all conduits of receptivity, allowing the places we go to inform our work, rather than view these places through a predetermined lens.  This will also have the effect of sharpening our observational and analytical skill sets, further broadening the scope of potential results.  We’re going to find out what happens when our options are limited only by time, the tools on hand, and the need to keep moving westward.

This is not to suggest that we don’t have additional, more specific questions.  Both Joe and I have established artistic practices which are informed by focused interests.  We consider these things our “artistic baggage”.  This baggage will go with us on our tour.  It will be with us as we pass through small Midwestern towns and when we cross the continental divide.  We’d like to know how such baggage fares under the demanding conditions of a bicycle tour.  In what new directions will our interests shift, and how will they be affected by what we encounter?  Will we maintain the convictions we’ve formed in the past? Additionally, how will the tour affect our fundamental ability to make art?  We’re placing a lot of faith in our existing drive to produce work, as well as in the seductiveness of the creative moment.  How will that drive fare when forced to compete with the more immediate demands and potentially severe conditions of life on the road?

Finally, we cannot underestimate the significance of the fact that two individuals means two unique sets of artistic concerns.  In fact, getting ourselves safely to the other side of the country is the only goal that can truly be described as shared.   We have agreed to help each other make work along the way, but again, the precise nature of that work has been intentionally left unresolved.  Some of what we produce will be highly personal, while other pieces will belong to both of us.  I think it is inevitable that we will occasionally disagree on how to best utilize our time, energy, and resources.  In an environment characterized by an ever-present pressure to keep moving, conflicts are sure to surface. They will have to be resolved quickly in the interest of the larger project.  The gritty details of such conflict resolutions are likely to play out in fascinating ways.  Already, and almost by accident, we find ourselves investigating the nature of collaboration.

bt

Chicago, August 2008

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A Little Q & A:

Why this Route?

If you’ve watched any of the adverts we’ve put together for the project you know the list: “Chicago, Portland, San Francisco.”  Chicago is our departure point.  Currently it’s also our home base: our training ground and our staging area.  In an earlier manifestation of the route, we had imagined Portland to be the terminus.  It was to be a grand arrival in America’s bicycle Mecca.  But the lure of the city by the bay, with hundreds of miles of rugged Pacific coastline for its approach and the Golden Gate as its front door, was too much to resist.  Portland is now the tour’s psychological (if not physical) mid-point and should provide ample opportunity to showcase some of what we’ll have made thus far.  Frisco is also a bicycle-centric city and just a short hop from my hometown of Davis, CA—the self-declared bicycle capitol of the world.  Our destination cities should be thought of as waypoints: places we would eventually like to end up.  The actual route between them, however, is flexible.  Generally, we’re going to follow our intuition when it comes to day-to-day decisions about where to head next.  Besides making an effort to steer ourselves through places of great natural beauty (Badlands, Yellowstone, and the Tetons) we will likely be attracted to sites that relate to our artistic interests.  For example, Joe might have us passing through a town with a reputation for having a particularly “colorful” restroom while I could see me wanting to make pilgrimages to decommissioned power plants.  It should be noted that these hypotheticals are just that.  Once we’re on the road, the possibilities will be nearly limitless.

Why you?

We have a running joke that addresses why the visual material produced on extended bicycle tours is usually so un-engaging: “Because they haven’t been to art school.”  Without being too harsh, I think it’s safe to say that there’s nothing particularly interesting about watching amateur video of middle-aged people on their bikes—even if it is shot in Thailand.  Remember, we’re not simply documenting our journey—we’re taking our established artistic practices on a long bike ride.  The images we produce are likely to reflect the fact that we both have years of training in the visual arts.

Why Now?

Our official departure date is September 15. It’s a full moon, which is particularly romantic and keeps reminding me of Hayao Miyazaki's Kiki’s Delivery Service.  We chose September not just to avoid the summer heat, but because it is a transitional month.  It’s a time when Americans are going back to school and back to work—returning to an operating mode characterized by habit and routine rather than the play and endless motoring of the summer months.  We also view the larger context of this country’s energy dilemma as ideal.  With gas prices high, and likely to remain so, it’s a good time to be a champion of low energy transportation.  Lastly, it’s a good time for us personally.  Having just completed graduate school, a long journey should be conducive to processing our last couple years in academia as well as seriously considering our futures.

How long will it take?

Putting aside any possible delays associated with equipment failures or extended side trips, we expect to be on the road between 40 and 50 days.  That puts us into San Francisco somewhere around the end of October or early November.  That’s if we can maintain a trip average of 65 miles per day and take a rest day for every ten we ride.

Where will you stay and what will you bring?

We’ll be carrying with us, on our bikes, everything we need to live relatively comfortably outdoors for a month and a half.  The equipment list reads much like  one associated with backpacking and includes essential items such as tents, sleeping pads/bags, camp stove, water filter, etc.  We’ll also be carrying everything we need to maintain our bikes as they are put through the abuse of eight hours of fully loaded operation day in and day out: spare tires, tubes and spokes as well as lube, tools, and cleaning supplies.

While we’ll be prepared to camp almost anywhere, (off the road, someone’s front lawn) we’re going to try and stay in people’s homes as much as possible.  Spreading word of our anticipated arrival in the towns just a day ahead of us, as well as the use of couch surfing websites will help connect us with willing hosts.

What about the cameras?

Ladies and Gentlemen, The Mobile Production Studio: Everything one needs to take, edit, and post video in a (sort of) lightweight, portable package.  We’re going tape-less which means our camera(s) will produce digital video that we’ll transfer directly to an external hard drive.  Without the necessity to waste valuable time capturing, we’ll be able to quickly edit what we’ve shot and post it here on this site within a few days.  We’ll be dividing our video-centric time between making these short pieces, and producing longer ones that may require the entirety of the tour to shoot and several months in postproduction.  The refined and focused nature of these more involved pieces means they will likely be better served by other formats. They may end up as documentary-style pieces, traditional gallery installations, or episodes on a cable television station.  A rugged solar charging system will keep all the lithium ions juiced and ready. (See the Mobile Production Studio diagram here. Downlaod the PDF here.)