sea light in the night                                                                   click to enlarge

super 8 window projections

Hamburg • Germany 2000

The building is the Seaman's Mission Hotel along the Elbe River in the port city of Hamburg, Germany. Seamen from all over the world stay one or two nights here before embarking on the ocean for several months, away from their country, family, and culture. The images projected are of various seamen and the waters that they travel. Funding was provided by Hadag, a local ship company that supplied an old harbor boat that transported the audience along the river to the hotel.

These seamen come from islands in the Pacific and countries around the world - kiribati, the philippines, sri lanka, Kashmir, bangladesh, capo verde... The portraits are of actual seamen and merchant sailors.

20 separate super 8 projectors were placed in the hallways of the building. They projected outward onto vellum covered windows, allowing the looped footage to appear. Sea Light in the Night transforms the perspective of land/sea and the people who have a relationship with both natures either living or working.  The building facade becomes a stage and the windows a reflection, projecting light, connections, fragments, and portraits that turn the sea and harbor in reverse and place it on land.