katvic – Reflecting Locations

same same but different

After this project I went to Bangkog and from there to Cambodia and traveled through this country. Still with the sensibility from our project reflecting locations and the impressions from Hong Kong and Zurich.

My time in Thailand and Cambodia influenced how i see Hong Kong , a place I reflected before, during and after my visit.
The time before the visits in Zurich, Hanz and me spoke and exchanged our footages. We searched for similarities, so he sent me material that showed resemblance with zurich. I searched for Hong kong in Zurich. The surprise in Hong Kong was big. There were so many differences I didn‘t think about because I didn’t focus on them. When you make a sample, in inklusion there is always exclusion. When I saw Hong Kong I was fascinated about the differences and I saw them everywhere. It was harder to collect similiar images. Before, when I only had my imagination it was much easier. The differences started to pop out now.

If you find similarities, you will find differences. They always will be there. The humans, the habbits, the plants, streets, buildings, air, food etc. Its never the same.
Hong Kong wasn‘t like my expectations and imaginations. In some way yes, but I saw another world when I arrived. I spoke with my friend in Cambodia about my experience in Hong Kong, and when I said, „I was in China..“ he got angry and told me that I haven’t been in china! Hong Kong isn‘t China! Of course I knew that but it makes a huge diffrent what you have seen before and where you came from. He traveled through China for 3 months and arrived in Hong Kong after that. For him it was like he was back in the western world. He had all the infrastructures again. But when I arrived in Hong Kong, I came directly from switzerland and I saw so much that reminded me of China or what I expected China to be.

After all I found a phrase in Thailand and Cambodia which is a perfect conclusion for this projekt.

You hear locals say very often “same same but different”. They also print this slogan on their shirts. This words fit with my experience in this project perfectely. I was delighted to see the humor of our hong kong friends. We laughed about the same stuff, I enjoyed the way of sarkasm they had and we were annoyed about the same things. I felt immediately, we are not that different. Even if I am some years older, live a different life and were raised on the other side of the planet. In many ways we are the same. The connection with our Hong Kong partners was the best part of this project. To work with a foreign partner from another culture was inspiring. To play the touristguides for each other was a chance to see and understand much more. I‘m very thankful for that, especially for meeting Hanz and working with him. Of course i’m also very grateful to have met Karen, Winnie and Alison. It‘s always a privilege to meet locals and to see behind the surface.

City similarities

Video installation from Hanz and Katarina

In a cooperation we recorded visual similarities of Hong Kong and Zurich. We filmed before and after our visits, in each town, together and separately. We mixed imagination with real perception. What do the different scenes of these two places tell us? What are the similarities?

Our search for what is similar in regard to urban structures, public transport and social interaction in public space finally enabled us to discern the subtle differences that only surface by direct comparison and juxtaposition.

Hong Kong – Zurich

Where I think I can find Hong Kong in Zurich. An imagination before visit.

escalator, see, tram…

Hong Kong – Zurich

a classic film countdown

version 2

assignment 3

Dear all, at first im really sorry for my delay, there were long, rough days in the last weeks. Yersterday I arrıved in istanbul and found time in this busy city.

To refelect a location, it’s also needed to reflect the pictures we have. My picture of another place based on the pictures I see. So, can the Pictures talk with us? What can they tell us? How can they come together and fit to a language that we understand?

In the last weeks I began with a projekt. As starting point serves a selection of images from my own photo collection. The Question was also how interchangeable my pictures are, especially from foreign places. Using the Google images backsearch, it will reverse out a visual media from the original collection and throws it back into the flood of images Google is showing. A variety of “visually similar images” will be presented by Google. There are similar color components and the distribution of the image is measured, also outlines and forms are compared. I abuse this search system. Usually this is used to upload your own images on Google and then control who uses our pictures (maybe) illegally.

The amount is also indicative to images of certain content meaning it’s mirroring social aspects. The inklusion und exclusion from Pictures and image content shows also a lot. It’s interesting how close the Google images are thematically to my self made images, even though they show something entirley different.

I will show some examples

Left is a picture taken by my self in Paris and right a Google result.

My picture which shows a man with a shopping cart on western streets, is again split up by google. In western and third world. An ethnological and economical separation.

The image of a dark skinned man with shopping cart returned in the search results mainly as Indian with car or white guy with shopping cart. The shopping cart, a symbol of capitalism and the Western world. The shopping cart on the photo is ironically used to earn money.

Thematically the only picture matching was a man in Greece also selling Maroni. The background in the right picture shows that the city in which he lives is economically inferior to the city ın the left picture. We also know it is a fact that greece is going through a financial crisis right now. The initial position of the two men, however, seems just the opposite. One improvised with what he had found, the other grilled with pretty professional equipment. In Greece money once was available.

Near Notre Dame, under a bridge, by the river, homeless people have set up. The ” visually similar ” Google results show People climbing on a mountain, rock or doing river rafting.

It’s apparently good that the search for consensus works especially in terms of color. The color variations of the stone bridge on the river leads to images of rock and river. The indication of human presence in the output picture leads to the physical presence of humans in all searching results.

In the reference image, the tragedy is only visible to the ones who can understand the given circumstances. Google does a purely optical analysis and filters out the information of camping adventurers. Even still relatively comfortable. But we are not a search engine and see the tragedy in and behind the image.

Now I had to find the most similar of all the ” visually similar ” images .

I focused here on the color match .

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Together the images develop a new language . They influence each other and create a new content. First Association ,the current refugee issue. Two stuffed boats . In a raging river. Emblematic for the difficult path in a temporary shelter in the western world.

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One and the same picture? Almost. If the differences are small, they start to stick out more. Attention is paid to details , like “find the 10 differences” . So the similarity is always reflecting differences . At the same time, the similarity also involves an exclusion of differences .

Unfortunately, the metadata of the image found is not available . Thus, we don’t know when these pictures were made. It could be the same evening or years in between.

Sightseeing..

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Eiffel Tower

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Beach in Tenerife . Here the agreement is to see the mood of the image . The Google results do not show the beach of Tenerife .

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Meglisalp in Switzerland . Again, the locations of the images found do not correspond with the original picture.

a parody of tourism..

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experiences..

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Based on this Project you can get an idea of my interests in this context.

I would be happy to work with someone who sends me a lot of pictures. These would be the basis and starting point of my work form, but are not mandatory visible in the final work. I want to try to see behind the pictures someway.

love being outdoors

Long time i have this big picture in my sleeping room and I think it will always be there where I live.

At the Switzerland I love nature and the evergreen meadows. It is so small and diverse, there are mountains with eternal snow and in the south are palm trees. Luckily, I have friends in the whole of Switzerland distributed so I’m everywhere.

A few weeks ago I lived for four years in the hilly Appenzell (following Pictures), now I moved back in the Thurgau (picture grain field, 5 min. from home).

For many years it was part of my daily routine to go ten to twenty kilometers. I enjoy this a lot. Wen I had time, I could do this all day long, alone or with friends. There are so many ways and typical Switzerland everything is signposted, so you can just start walking aimlessly.

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Now I am studying in Zurich, this has changed a lot. I’m losing a lot of time on the train. When I was living in Appenzell I had four hours there and back to college, now from Thurgau three hours. Why I started to make free House and Petsitting, so I live now and then a few weeks in Zurich in foreign homes.

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The Building of my university is the opposite of what i like. There are many corridors and they all look pretty the same, white with industrial light and minergie ventilation. many kilometers. It’s forbidden to put something at the wall or at the floor.