LAI By Chen Carmi

1 I had this epiphany: the character that seems to connect all my work is its wandering, unrooted nature. I dealt with that subject years ago, before I dragged myself to a richer country. Little birds often remind me of photographs of immigrant women, especially those that were taken at Ellis Island by Lewis Hine and others—tiny creatures, covered with shawls; in their eyes we see completion. In those pictures the background always seems to “wear” them like a new garment

Lewis Hine, Immigrant Women in Line for Inspection at Ellis Island, 1914

I saw this trio of zebra doves1 hopping around on a concrete floor next to a building’s entrance in Honolulu.

Chen Carmi, from Do Not Feed the Birds, 2009

They recalled for me the lower left portion of the painting, The Fight between Carnival and Lent by Pieter Bruegel.

Pieter Bruegel, The Fight Between Carnival and Lent, 1559

1

Originally from Southern Thailand, Myanmar, Malaysia, Sumatra and the Philippines, but considered to be an invasive species elsewhere.

Look at the small figures of a man holding a stick with two candles and the woman next to him, wearing a shawl. Notice the birdlike position of their bodies My parents had this painting hanging above the television. As a child, I loved the bird’s eye point of view, high above insect-like humans in their everyday unawareness. It is amazing how clearly we see things from a distance. When I took the photographs of the doves, they looked so much like those morbid Netherlanders, yet, they do not seem nearly as cruel or as foolish. Unlike Bruegel, I have the compassion that comes with secularity. I know that some of my perplexed viewers hope my art has an allegorical intention, yet there is only so much I can steal from others’ sorrow. 2 In their excellent book Feral Pigeons,2 Richard Johnston and Marian Janiga discuss the different incarnations of the Columba Livia: its beginning stage as a rockpigeon, the second as a domestic pigeon, and the final as a feral pigeon (pigeons which themselves, or their ancestors, escaped from captivity). The physical and behavioral differences that distinguish the different types of pigeons are almost unseen, and very human in nature. Unlike the rock pigeon, the feral pigeons: Mate all year round Are highly prolific Do not migrate Are capable of adapting to almost any environment

Richard F. Johnston and Marián Janiga, Feral Pigeons (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 105-120. 2

Do not molt Can easily be conditioned to eat from the human hand The authors point out a fatal anthropomorphic class division which humans express toward pigeons based on human language, culture and history. “Our thinking,” they write, “associates rock pigeons as ‘natural or noble wild birds,’ domestic pigeons as ‘artificial or indentured servants’ and feral pigeons as ‘fugitives from captivity, or outlaws.”’3 But who do the writers include when they say “our thinking” ? In my urban wandering, I noticed that parents with children, elders, lonely women and disabled persons with caregivers love pigeons and spend hours feeding them. I had a long conversation with a homeless woman; she knew when and where the flock of Long Beach city hall is present at any given time.4 In Israel, when bread molds, it is left outside for birds. Pigeons are so tolerated in Israel that they are free to mate, nest and drop from the high cracks of the wailing wall, just above the prayers’ heads. The most extensive observations on pigeons prior to the 1990s took place in Russia. Here are few more facts I learned from Feral Pigeons: in a colony in Moscow during 1985, 41 to 50 percent of the birds died less than one-year-old, 37 to 42 percent lived more than one year and less than two, 11.7 to 14.4 percent lived two to three years

Ibid., 78. She explained to me that many pigeons lose legs because of strings: the strings become entangled around the birds’ legs and the birds tighten them while trying to take them off, an action that eventually leads to necrosis. 3 4

and 0.9 to 3.9 precent lived three to four years. While homing in optimal conditions, pigeons may live to 31 years old.5 The main causes of death are cold and starvation. The feral pigeons are birds that repeatedly escaped captivity, and, like human outcasts, find rest in very small rural groups or in large urban colonies. The researchers describe how modern times have changed few pigeon colonies’ inhibition patterns. At first, the pigeons moved from the city squares to safer nesting spots under highway bridges, and from there to rocks nearby—in other words, back to nature—on a journey that takes ten to twenty years. Johnston and Janiga described a flock of seemingly rock pigeons who were spotted in the cliffs of Flamborough, England in 1989 that turned out to be feral.6 Here, just under our noses and everywhere around us, an avian exodus is taking place. Here is my own piece of anthropomorphism. 3 I told my brother I see great resemblance between Vladimir Nabokov’s Loilta and Ludvik Vaculik’s The Guinea Pigs: the main characters, both men, are seemingly healthy members of society that experience the secret indulgence and pains of having helpless, tortured, prisoners in their hands. He replied: “Aren’t you portraying the same in your work?” Herons. They stand alone, wrapped in long foppish feathers, observing from afar. W.G. Sebald’s writing on moths suits here well: “I do remember,” said Austerlitz, “that the two of us, Gerald and I, could not get over our amazement at the endless variety of these invertebrates, which are

5

Johnston and Janiga, 80.

6

Ibid., 82.

usually hidden from our sight, and that Alphonso let us simply gaze at their wonderful display for a long time . . . . Some had collars and cloaks, like elegant gentlemen on their way to the opera, said Gerald; some had a plain basic hue, but when they moved their wings showed a fantastic lining underneath, with oblique and wavy lines, shadows, crescent markings and lighter patches, freckles, zigzag bands, fringes and veining and colours you could never have imagined” ( W.G. Sebald, Austerlitz)7 The herons move slowly and quietly while staring at the water, waiting for fish. In their aloofness they remind me of the type of men that are often described as “creepers,” especially the kind who stroll alone in parks. If there are still members of society that are judged based on what they must be thinking, they are these lonely longers.

Chen Carmi, from LAI, 2013

4 In my work, the most important thing for me is not to be clear, but to be accurate. As a result, my work becomes more “thin,” not in terms of content but in a term of visual

7

W.G. Sebald, Austerlitz, trans. Anthea Bell (New York: Random House, 2001), 44.

language. The brightest explanation of the necessity of reduction I find in Denis Dedirot’s critique of the work of François Boucher: Imaging in the background a vase on a pedestal crowned with a bunch of heavily drooping branches; beneath it, a shepherd asleep in the lap of his shepherdess. Arrange around them a shepherd’s crook, a little hat full of roses, a dog, some sheep, a bit of countryside and countless other objects piled on top of each other. Paint the lot in the brightest colours and there you have Boucher’s Pastoral Scene. What a misuse of talent! How much time gone to waste! You could have had twice the effect for half the effort. With so many details all equally carefully painted, the eye doesn’t know where to look. No air. No rest. And yet the shepherdess does have the right face for her station. And this bit of countryside surrounding the vase does have a delicacy, a freshness, a surprising charm. But what does this vase and its pedestal mean? What’s the meaning of those heavy branches on top of it? When one writes, does one have to write everything? And when one paints, does one have to paint everything? For pity’s sake, leave something to my imagination. But if you say that to the man who has been corrupted by praise and who is convinced of his own talent, he’ll just nod his head in disdain; you’ll say your piece and we’ll move on.8 A fine expression of beneficial reduction one can find in the movie Caché (Hidden), by Michael Haneke.9 Indeed, this project is inspired by the visual language of that movie, not only in the way it contributed to my from-a-distance-heron-like observation, but also in the way I set up the stage for the occurrences to present themselves over time.

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Denis Diderot, 1759, 1761, 1763, Vol 1. of Salons, ed. Jean Adhemar and Jean Francois Seznec (Oxford: University Press, 1975), 344. 9

The movie, which was released in 2005, deals with the subject of post colonial foreignness and denial in the French society. A hidden camera plays a key role in manipulating the main characters in the movie and the viewers.

Michael Haneke, from caché, 2005

Michael Haneke, from caché, 2005

5 Just as the still camera captures images differently than the human eye, without hierarchy, so does the video camera with sounds. Both of the cameras force the observer to confront data which he/she usually does not notice. Paying attention to this normally eliminated information brings many delightful moments of revelation. One of the reasons why I admire the work of Haneke so greatly is because of his abstention from using soundtrack. The sounds of passing cars, blowing wind, and rustling leaves are so beautiful to my ears; I truly do not understand why other filmmakers use separately

recorded soundtracks as a default. I also wonder why it took me so long to realize that this simple act of reduction is one of the strongest elements of his work. Due to this abstention from using overlaid soundtrack, when we hear the sounds of human-composed music in Haneka’s films (a man playing Schubert, a congregation praying in church), it always says something striking about us humans. 6 The last scene in my video shows a few pigeons gamboling next to a crossroad. I edited this scene with the song I See My Pretty Papa Standing on a Hill by Eva Parker. I cannot fully explain this decision; I simply looked at the footage and all of a sudden heard the song in my head. I added the music to the image and felt I created something complete. I never loved but one old lady son and I hope I’ll never love another one I see my pretty papa standing on a hill and he look like a ten thousand dollar bill And he look like a ten thousand dollar bill I love my papa he’s a good looking brown But he left me and he pushed me to the ground We down in Georgia we journey bound; we’ve got brown skin that I used to call them in We down in Georgia we journey bound; we’ve got brown skin that I used to call them in He left me one evening I can’t understand Down in Georgia he’s another older man That’s why I am crying The hurt in my heart He left me and the life that’s he’s known10

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(Eva Parker, “I See My Pretty Papa Standing on a Hill”, in I Listen to the Wind That Obliterates My Traces, ed. Steve Roden (Atlanta: Dust-to-Digital, 2011), 50.

I got acquainted with the song from the book I Listen to the Wind That Obliterates My Traces by Steve Roden.11 I find this title alone, which is in itself a quotation from a poem by Per Lagerkvist, to be the perfect wording to my feelings while working on this project. I walked the streets of Los Angeles and listened to the wind that obliterated my traces.

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An assemblage of early American recordings and photographs in addition to excerpts of Rodan’s and others’ writings.