Sinter Method: Mister Wister Time Twister

A little something on what I've been working on in Paris: I came across this great french cartoon the other day about this character "Mister Wister" who looses his hat and goes back in time to retrieve it. Now, this reminded me of my obsession with my hats and the fondness for each. Most are aware that I wear some kind of "lobal warming" at all times. There have been times when I've had to retrace my tracks on my bike for miles in the middle of the night, looking for fallen hats that I had stuck in my back pocket while switching it out for my bike helmet.

I was immediately attracted to Mister Wister's red wardrobe and the scene with the pink flowers towards the end. Perhaps because I have been feeling the same hypnotic feeling while walking down the old, charming streets of Montmartre, and it feels like literally stepping into a time machine. The scenes of the traffic is also reminiscent of walking around the city.

On some past thoughts: I started researching ufo related activities while in Puerto Rico last year with Izel Vargas, one of my past grad students. We had watched this documentary about the citizens of Lajas and their accounts of sightings around that area of the island. Laguna Cartagena, pictured on the right on the southwest part of the island near the Caribbean Sea, was talked about as a possible "underwater tunnel"; a transport for USO's to reach the island from the Sea. Also pictured above is the Arecibo Observatory, which appeared in episodes of the x-files and below in the movie Contact with Jodie Foster.

Some of you may know that Puerto Rico sits in one of the corners of the Bermuda Triangle and is a hot bed for UFO activity. Not that I completely believe all this stuff but we explored in and around the area of Laguna Cartagena, which was quite an adventure- the place was miles away from population and we encountered quite a character while there, but thats for another time. Perhaps he will make it into this project. We also visited the Arecibo Observatory, the largest radio-telescope in the world.

The Abyss... one of my favorite movies, also played a roll in my desire to explore this concept of an underwater passage way leading to the interior of the island. Youre probably wondering where I'm going with all of this or thinking that I've completely lost my mind. Well hang on and I will make it come back full circle, hopefully:

I was really interested in the history of Puerto Rico and its colonization state since the 15th century. The island could still be called one of the only colonies left in the world- under US rule since the end of the Spanish American war in the late 1800's. I wanted to explore a metaphor that addressed the individual psyches of the cultures of such affected regions ("insularismo" as Pedraira calls it or / insular identity) Puerto Rican culture has a rich history of myths and folklore that is influenced by it's history of colonization. From Vejigantes to Chupacabras, these characters were/are invaders of the island/culture. Today, the invaders could very well be the "aliens" invading the island. Almost all puerto rican inslanders have some sort of story about a flying object they have witnessed or a tale of how the chupacabra has affected them.

I was also thinking of the word "alien". The word ranges from foreign to extraterrestrial. For many latinos the word refers to a discourse related to denigration, which may imply to be of non-american status.

Back to Paris: I have also been a bit obsessed with reading about the disappearance of flight AF 447 over the atlantic. Maybe it's because it affected a lot of Parisians and I see images in every newspaper stand, or perhaps it's my old obsession with flight/planes/maps/migration. Either-way, I was walking down the street the other day by the Madelaine and felt pretty broken up upon seeing the families of the victims being escorted to Notre Dame for the memorial service by police. Not to be insensitive in any way, but the whole mystery behind the disappearance; no one quite knowing what really happened, etc. makes me think of the 80's movie Millenium, about the disappearance of a plane, space ships, abduction, time travel, etc.

I rewatched the trailer of the movie the other day (Trailer) and gathered several connections to the cartoon I watched earlier this week. For instance, one thing that stood out right away was the flight attendants get-up: red suits and hats.

Coincidence? probably...but visually similar to this cartoon's bright red suit...

On with more sanity:

Some of my conceptual goals for this project are: (1) I hope to highlight the significance of the metaphor of travel, perhaps the metaphor of time travel and its effect on identity (2) to rethink some of the identifying traits of "insularismo" as described by Antonio Pedreira in his book (3) to examine a cognitive approach to narrative video and animation.

Oh yea, I've also had one of my colleague's body of work below on my mind as well: Mike Sonnichsen. I keep thinking of these.