|
In March 2006 I travelled to Cyprus as a member of the University of Wollongong, Faculty of Creative Arts ‘Sonic Architectures Project’ team to map the ancient theatre site at Paphos. My brief was to provide a photographic record of visual material data that could be used along with other mapped modalities to estimate the dimensions, proportions and negative space of the theatre, as well as describe the haptic qualities of the theatre materials. It is anticipated that the mapped data be used as an information system to construct a sonic map of the theatre.
This project is also significant in that it has facilitated further research for my Doctorate of Creative Arts work, which explores the journey of understanding site as a work-in-progress.
‘It is this natural process of change on an archaeological site – the construction, use, abandonment and destruction and burial – that archaeologists are interested in. Each different phase will yield evidence about the chronology of a site and the way in which it was used by successive generations…. The very process of archaeological excavation, as more and more of the site is revealed, is also part of the overall history of the site …’ (Green, Barker and Gabrieli 8).
The process of visually mapping a site reveals the material culture of archaeology, which at Paphos is largely concerned with fragments due to a history of multiple earthquakes. The piecing together of found fragments, objects and structures reveals much about the human culture that existed on the site throughout its history. The site is like a work-in-progress: as the site is surveyed, ordered and excavated, fragments are unearthed to reshape and recontextualise the emerging picture of the past. By photographically capturing and documenting the material evidence of this process, the map creates a contextual layer of visual information, which references both historical and contemporary processes and knowledge systems.
The theatre site at Paphos reveals evidence and characteristics of both Greek and Roman theatres. Through archaeological associations and the structure and nature of its theatrical performance space, the theatre significantly links the past with the present and contributes to the interdisciplinary nature of the 2006 UOW Sonic Architectures Project: Mapping the Ancient Theatre Through Sound and Image. At Paphos and in Wollongong this year, the artists, actors and musicians involved in the project have used both traditional and contemporary technologies and time-based media to map the site in collaboration with specialists such as the site architect, surveyor and archaeologists. The Sonic Architectures: Works In Progress exhibition in the Faculty of Creative Arts Gallery during September 2006, incorporates graphite rubbings, lithography, digital photography, 360degree virtual tours, video and sound to map the theatre space.
The problem I faced as a photographer was to develop a mapping process that would enable me to visually record the site topology of the theatre using the mathematical co-ordinates of the existing archaeological grid whilst maintaining a ‘hands-on’ embodiment and presence on the site.
I posed several key questions that pre-empted the methodology of the project. How can I physically align my body and camera to the theatre axis? How can other site specialists assist me? How long will the process take? How can I order the capture of the topography? How will I manage such a digital project in terms of file storage, processing and post-processing workflow? I was also interested in how the process itself might inform both photographic and archaeological understanding of the theatre site, and facilitate a visual and aesthetic system to emerge.
At Bundanon in 2005, my fieldwork explored the physicality of photographic practice, and knowledge systems inspired by the work of Mandy Martin and the interdisciplinary Strata project, based at Puritjarra in Central Western Australia. I gleaned advice from Krim Benterrak, Stephen Muecke and Paddy Roe in their book Reading the Country about sourcing information from ‘local guides’ and recognising that the journey in finding the significance of place ‘is as much intellectual as it is physical’ (Benterrak, Muecke and Roe 26). The project methodology was driven by process and informed by key information systems and so pre-empted the work in Cyprus.
At Paphos the mapping process mirrored the archaeological process in several ways: it was repetitive, labour-intensive, methodical and anchored to systems based on the grid. I enlisted the assistance of the site surveyor, Kerry Platt, who used a laser theodolite to reference the co-ordinates of the archaeological grid, in much the same way as he assists the architect when mapping excavation trenches and finds. Without such a system an archaeological artefact is determined ‘out of context’, irrelevant for the purpose of research and consequently of no academic value. Several information systems inform the grid, and thus inform my map: the surveying system which pinpoints local datum co-ordinates, the archaeological system of excavation which visually textures and orders the topography, and the architectural system which records boundaries, co-ordinates and the process of excavation on the architectural plan of the site.
My visual map is a spatial map that records the dimensions and topology of the site through real-time physical navigation up and across the theatre space. The repetitious and somewhat mechanical process of moving up and over 4,250 square metres of uneven ground for two days was directed by the theodolite’s position on the orthogonal axis of the theatre and the surveyor calling to me ‘forward…back…’ to keep my lens aligned to the east-west axis of the grid, as I captured image after image. The map comprises 55 rows spaced 1m apart and incorporates a total of 2,143 images. During capture each individual image covered up to 1.5m width of space, depending upon the variable height of the topography underfoot at the time.
The outcomes of the project depended upon the changing light, the consistency of photographic techniques and settings such as lens focal length, shutter speed, aperture and focus, the topographical height and irregularity, and my stepping sequence. The level of concentration and the communication between me and the surveyor and his assistant were equally important.
Undertaking a project of this nature requires stamina and perseverance, and a kind of vision that borders on the obsessive! Managing over 2,000 digital images, each with an original file size of 16.1mb requires a rigorous approach to digital workflow. As each row was captured using a Nikon D200, file names were recorded in a journal and any unexpected variations to the system were noted. Images were downloaded from high capacity CompactFlash cards to a laptop three times a day and were backed up to CD Rom in the evening. The map was composited using Adobe Photoshop CS, following the rules of yet another system. Files were reduced in size and assembled in rows based on the capture documentation, to provide an overall mapped image of 4m x 2.95m. The original files have the potential to produce a 12m x 9m map without interpolation.
The assemblage of photographic frames creates a visual manifestation of the grid, as images are ordered and composited as they were captured, in time and ‘in place’. The resultant visual system describes the material culture of the Paphos theatre site under excavation, blurring boundaries between archaeological traditions and the topology itself. Through spatial mapping the material qualities and negative spaces of the theatre can be observed.
The map is an information system that has met the outcomes of my Brief for the Sonic Architectures Project and provides the potential for further research. The assemblage of photographic frames reflects aspects of the archaeological process. Through the visual study of material culture, the past is brought into the light of the present as the fragments of a ruin are pieced and stitched together to make sense of the confusion and visual disarray that typifies the archaeological site under excavation. The grid is the web that holds it all together; it can keep matter in place and fragments in their cultural context. Yet whilst the grid remains fixed, the physical matter of an archaeological site is constantly changing. As old layers are sifted, trowelled and discarded, new layers of the past emerge to re-shape and re-contextualise the history of place. And thus, a new map emerges.
Diane Epoff
Krim Benterrak, Stephen Muecke and Paddy Roe. Reading the Country: Introduction to Nomadology, Rev. ed, Fremantle Arts Centre Press, South Fremantle, 1996. 26
Richard Green, Craig Barker and Smadar Gabrieli, Fabrika: An Ancient Theatre of Paphos, Moufflon Publications Ltd., Lefkosia, 2004. 8
Mandy Martin, ‘Desert of the Mind’s Eye‘, Strata: Deserts Past, Present and Future, Mandy Martin, Mandurama, 2005.
Stephen Muecke, Ancient and Modern, University of New South Wales Press, Sydney, 2004, 78.
Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. Phenomenology of Perception “The Visible and the Invisible”, trans. Alfonso Lingis. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1968. 253.
Michael Shanks and Christopher Tilley, Re-Constructing Archaeology: Theory and Practice, Routledge, London, 1992, 7.
|
