Lucy Ravens- Lecture

Lucy Ravens: China Town Lecture

Lucy Ravens had a unique idea and a determined attitude to create a stop animation piece that goes beyond just art. Ravens in lecture explained the process, the time it took, her luck, and the determination it took to make this art/ environmental project work. Her trials and tribulations in finishing this project sing praises of her fortitude and commitment to the project. The idea and eventual finished product of stop frame animation with ambient noises plays with the perception of the piece.

Lucy began her lecture by outlining her history in the art world along with a short example of her past political pieces depicting the hardships of the dust bowl in the 1930’s depression. Her work at first seems simple, yet explanatory. The simplicity of the animation draws the viewer’s attention in at the hardships of the time. The quiet of the room and the buildup of the piece show you the artistic talent and time Raven’s take in creating a piece, for more than art, but to explain a hardship in America’s past.

Her style of art went through a major evolution when she transitioned from art stop frame animation, to shutter speed digital photographic animation. Her artistic eye did help her in explaining the story and evolution of the copper process. But, it was not about her photographic skill or about the capturing of one artistic photograph; the art was the journey, the art explaining the evolutionary circle of the copper process. It is hard for someone to understand the magnitude and the time it took to make this animation, and that time she spent traveling and uncovering the whole history is intriguing.

To understand her animation and understand the process, one must understand her journey. She had to wait most places up to thirty days just to take a few hours of photography. She had to convince the mines and the factories she was not an environmentalist, so she could get in. She had to travel to multiple factories and facilities just to understand the transition from the old copper mining industry to today’s. She showed us the Colorado mine that is trying to create a livable area out of the copper mining waste depository. She showed us the ghost towns resulting from the boom and bust of the copper industry. She showed us pictures of the last standing American smelting facility. The behind the screens photography and stories, that one could never understand without first had experience. Without the understanding of the process, without the knowledge of the amount of work she had to do, or where the inspiration came from. The viewer never really understands this artwork.

To make a piece of this magnitude, she recorded over 65,000 photos and put in hours of editing and processing to create a final artwork. But, her lecture was less about the data and more about the adventure and thought that went into this animation, and I believe this is where we find the true hart of this artist, Lucy Ravens. The art work is beautiful, and tells a story through carefully taken photographs and audio recording. However, one must understand that it is not the actual process not the actual photo sequences, but the idea behind the work and determination it took to make this animation. Chinese labor was the foundation and beginning of the copper industry in the United States, and now we (Nevada) provide the raw materials for the industrialization of China itself. Her art showing the manufacturing of copper from earth to light bulb, the real meaning behind the piece and why it is called China Town. Her lecture was not to explain the piece as much as it explained the journey and how that created her piece of art.

Questions: Why did you want to use stop frame animation so much, was it your history with hand drawn stop frame animation that drew you to it or some other factor? In your journeys and all of the time spent fighting people to see the processes you wanted to see and going behind the scene, according to you what environmental changes need to be made to make this process easier on the worlds environment ?