Patent Pending, 2013
Documentation of live performance, 33:29
The 2013 Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival concluded with "Patent Pending," a unique CONTACT festival event produced by Toronto's Spectrum Music and Karen Ostrom.
The result of a yearlong collaboration between Ostrom and Toronto composer Shannon Graham, “Patent Pending” presented a unique collaboration of original live music and multiple projections, and was presented at the 918 Bathurst Art Centre.
Installation & Animation: Karen Ostrom
Composition: Shannon Graham, Ben Dietschi, Caitlin Smith
Violin: Véronique Mathieu
Trumpet: Lina Allemano
Piano/Toy Piano: Stephanie Chua
Bass: Jesse Dietschi
This is not a Love Story
It’s the being of two minds
where the factories hum
in a relative calm
Where action meets inaction
it writes itself
it rights itself
it can’t rite itself
its a total re-write
Ideas are planted
Sewn
Into the minutes of each day
The salt breeze brings changes
Everything it touches
She knows he’s there
He sometimes watches her
wondering about his head and where it came from
and if he lost his head, would he also lose his mind?
She wonders too, watching him
She wonders if the confusion comes from having so many heads
She thinks about death
Is there work after death?
There are just so many bodies needing to get a head
She wonders how one can change their mind without changing their head
It keeps the factories running
Through the eye of the needle she can see the future
It’s always the same
Through the eye she sees the present
There is a present in the future
There is future in the present presence
It hung in the air like a suggestion
A little more salt breeze
an idea begins to form
to crystallize
as if from a dream
Confusion & Clarity embrace
She always wanted to tell him this
He didn’t want to know
Is this not a Love Story??
The factories keep running….they’re never idle
He wonders if it were his decisions or his dreams
Their 2 minds getting to the heart of the matter
He dreams of death
He dreams of another change of mind
The silence between them having no meaning