No. 7408 - 21 Aug 2011 - 15:18:19
31 August 2011
30 August 2011
29 August 2011
28 August 2011
27 August 2011
25 August 2011
18 August 2011
17 August 2011
14 August 2011
Frozen Music
*I call architecture frozen music*
Goethe
This morning I am off to sing with the church choir at St. James' Anglican where I can test my courage by cantoring the Alleluia. To sing alone within the architectural vibrations of this particular edifice is breathtaking and edifying - and then I melt.
06 August 2011
05 August 2011
04 August 2011
03 August 2011
01 August 2011
27 July 2011
18 July 2011
Succulents
No. 4156 (detail) - 18 Jun 2011 - 17:15:42I live in a rain forest and seldom complain about the weather. I have often mused (this time of year) that, if it is still raining by July, I too may become grumpy but after a spring spent on the prairie flood-plain I am keeping my perspective. I returned to Vancouver in the thrall of a cool and wet early summer and with the natives none too pleased about it and yet the gardens were and are full of flowers and flowering things.
No complaints here.
17 July 2011
16 July 2011
15 July 2011
14 July 2011
09 July 2011
Family Plot
No. 2028 - 29 May 2011 - 10:48:49 * No. 2037 - 29 May 2011 - 10:58:58
No. 2057 - 29 May 2011 - 11:10:13
No. 2055 - 29 May 2011 - 11:09:36 * No. 2066 - 29 May 2011 - 11:12:19
I have been to this Catholic cemetery, in St. François-Xavier (turn off the Trans Canada Highway west of Winnipeg at the statue of the White Horse), three times in the last twenty years because this is where my grandmother was born and she and her nine siblings were baptised in the church pictured above. I spent three days in the Manitoba Archives recently, searching through Henderson's Directories on micro-fiche for any mention of the great grandparents who came to settle in Manitoba from Québec after 1875 and found evidence for Narcisse Cayer II and Marie Perras having lived in the parish before they died. Upon returning to the cemetery this year it took only five minutes to locate these people, my great great grandparents,
who came from LaPrairie, Québec.
Happily and unexpectedly I was also given access to an ancestor chart which lays out 400-500 plus years of my maternal grandmother's Quebec and French ancestry. Additionally, I have discovered, through further research, that the very Marie Perras buried here represents the family's direct line back to Charlemagne and the merovingiens. A large percentage of French people can trace a similar link and it is exhilarating to connect to history, in such a familal way, with names and dates. My field of interest is in the migration of human populations and rather broader than the study of my personal genealogy but smaller, independent and community based stories often reflect the larger movements just as a tree in the forest appears to be
a fractal of the entire forest.
The cemetery is showing its age and the current state of flood affairs in the province of Manitoba. The sinking tombstone, in the bottom left corner above, belongs to Father Kavanagh, the half-blind, Irish priest who baptised my grandmother and her many siblings and
whose messy French longhand is a struggle and satisfaction for me to read and translate.
I was happy to find him resting next to my
great great grandparents.
who came from LaPrairie, Québec.
Happily and unexpectedly I was also given access to an ancestor chart which lays out 400-500 plus years of my maternal grandmother's Quebec and French ancestry. Additionally, I have discovered, through further research, that the very Marie Perras buried here represents the family's direct line back to Charlemagne and the merovingiens. A large percentage of French people can trace a similar link and it is exhilarating to connect to history, in such a familal way, with names and dates. My field of interest is in the migration of human populations and rather broader than the study of my personal genealogy but smaller, independent and community based stories often reflect the larger movements just as a tree in the forest appears to be
a fractal of the entire forest.
The cemetery is showing its age and the current state of flood affairs in the province of Manitoba. The sinking tombstone, in the bottom left corner above, belongs to Father Kavanagh, the half-blind, Irish priest who baptised my grandmother and her many siblings and
whose messy French longhand is a struggle and satisfaction for me to read and translate.
I was happy to find him resting next to my
great great grandparents.
08 July 2011
07 July 2011
Zsa Zsa
No. 4630 - 05 Jul 2011 - 11:50:47 * No. 4653 - 05 Jul 2011 - 12:25:34
Tomorrow: pictures of the garden across the street where I took a walk the other day.The Drive
This bloG is powered by photography.
I am briefly on hiatus while recuperating from knee surgery and as I am unable to walk the beat for new pictures and find myself preoccupied with an academic project requiring the collecting of data and a spot of serious writing I must be content with musing on the great shaggy feline who sprawls about and keeps me company. She hates having her picture taken and would rather groom her big fur coat, prowl the great outdoors or eat tuna than submit to my creative attention (boredom). I am allergic to my old friend and our live-in reunion is as temporary as my immobility.
This bloG is powered by photography.
I am briefly on hiatus while recuperating from knee surgery and as I am unable to walk the beat for new pictures and find myself preoccupied with an academic project requiring the collecting of data and a spot of serious writing I must be content with musing on the great shaggy feline who sprawls about and keeps me company. She hates having her picture taken and would rather groom her big fur coat, prowl the great outdoors or eat tuna than submit to my creative attention (boredom). I am allergic to my old friend and our live-in reunion is as temporary as my immobility.
01 July 2011
30 June 2011
25 June 2011
Topography
No. 3868 (detail) - 11 Jun 2011 - 19:10:08The Drive
When I was a little girl, growing up on the edge of Grouse Mountain in the City of North Vancouver, I asked my mother what was on the other side of the mountains and she told me, "more mountains". I found the answer to be insufficient although I understood its veracity. Perhaps I meant to ask "what is on the other side of the obstacles I have yet to negotiate?"
My failure to post lately is due to a depressing cold I caught during my road trip which I still nurse while waiting for a bit of arthroscopic surgery on my right knee. In spite of a recent postponement I look forward to recovering the mobility I lost three years ago when I was last hit by the chronic illness stick and fell in the well.
Fortunately, I was able to chronicle and complete a body of work documenting civic, architectural, biological and social life, situated as I was, at an 8th floor outpost on the corner of Main and Hastings - an address so horrible that I barely mentioned it by name on these pages.
And yet the view was spectacular.
When I first began to capture this southern perspective of Metro Vancouver someone noted that it was a shame I did not also have a view of the North Shore Mountains to which I replied, "I know they are there and that is enough". They have my back even when I cannot see them and now inspire feelings of gravitas and continuity rather than appearing to be obstacles to expansion and self-discovery.
I am at liberty to look forward with a view to the opportunities in my 360 degrees of landscape consciousness at dimeChronicle. On the other side of the mountains are more beautiful mountains.
Regards,
CH
When I was a little girl, growing up on the edge of Grouse Mountain in the City of North Vancouver, I asked my mother what was on the other side of the mountains and she told me, "more mountains". I found the answer to be insufficient although I understood its veracity. Perhaps I meant to ask "what is on the other side of the obstacles I have yet to negotiate?"
My failure to post lately is due to a depressing cold I caught during my road trip which I still nurse while waiting for a bit of arthroscopic surgery on my right knee. In spite of a recent postponement I look forward to recovering the mobility I lost three years ago when I was last hit by the chronic illness stick and fell in the well.
Fortunately, I was able to chronicle and complete a body of work documenting civic, architectural, biological and social life, situated as I was, at an 8th floor outpost on the corner of Main and Hastings - an address so horrible that I barely mentioned it by name on these pages.
And yet the view was spectacular.
When I first began to capture this southern perspective of Metro Vancouver someone noted that it was a shame I did not also have a view of the North Shore Mountains to which I replied, "I know they are there and that is enough". They have my back even when I cannot see them and now inspire feelings of gravitas and continuity rather than appearing to be obstacles to expansion and self-discovery.
I am at liberty to look forward with a view to the opportunities in my 360 degrees of landscape consciousness at dimeChronicle. On the other side of the mountains are more beautiful mountains.
Regards,
CH
15 June 2011
Watching Vancouver Burn
No. 3958 - 15 Jun 2011 - 20:38:17*from a safe place in Grandview*
GAME OVER - SAY. NO. MORE!
09 June 2011
ParkOvergrowingFourHouses
No. 3644 - 07 Jun 2011 - 20:36:28This park and the four houses on its eastern side were the first subjects of an iPhoto Bookmark project begun five years ago. ParkOnFourHouses is due a retrospective look and perhaps indicates a return to an early interest in the small architecture of Vancouver's historic east side.
08 June 2011
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