Do you travel a lot for work? I do. Four cross country flights in about a month seems like a fair bit of travel to me. I have often had an issue with the volume of travel and its impact on the environment. While this does not eliminate the carbon released into the atmosphere, it does help to reduce the impact of that carbon.
I would like to encourage any of you who travel a lot for work or fun to consider this or a similar program.
My daily life is about as minimal in energy usage as it can be. I turn off all excessive lighting in my home, walk or take public transportation everywhere, eat vegetarian always and locally when possible. A few weeks ago I checked out a CO2 calculator and I was well under the national average, near the bottom in fact and this was looking promising. Then I accounted for my work. At that point the scales tipped dramatically, both in terms of the actual lighting work as well as the travel.
I have been thinking about this a lot recently since I travel so much for work. My air travel amounts to tens of thousands of air miles a year. While this is great for my income and frequent flyer programs, it is not so hot for the atmosphere. What I have decided to do is offset the carbon emissions from my air travel.
This is a simple way to solve an otherwise unsolvable problem. I need to travel for my work. The CO2 emissions are going to happen. There is no realistic way to cut that down, short of giving up my art. But I can do something about the impact that CO2 has.
If you are interested in this as well, here are a few things you can do. First, start off by determining where you are now with a Carbon Calculator. The calculator auto updates when you enter your own numbers over the sample.
Then, look to options like CFL’s, electronics recycling or eliminating junk mail. You could consider shifting to a more vegetarian diet or taking public transportation more often as well.
If, after all this, you find you still emit a large volume of CO2 and would like to do something more about it, consider buying carbon offsets. Best of all, these offsets are tax deductible, so not only will you be helping the environment you will be lightening your tax burden as well.
That is all.
I want to go back to Spain. I loved visiting that country. I was there for less than a week, but was captivated by the magical quality of the place. From the Gypsies in Barcelona who drank with us all night and tried repeatedly to steal our wallets, to the windmills in Andausia.
I went to Spain the summer before I lit a production of House of Bernarda Alba. Seeing the different quality of light in Spain, helped me get to very strong sense of light for the play. Especially southern Spain, where the light is pregnant with mystical possibility. This is true even during the more prosaic noonday heat.
I took the following picture in Sevilla in 1999. There was almost no detail of the road on the negative and all the windows were solid black. Yes, negative, back when digital photography was not de rigueur. I loved the composition, and I could not develop the print in a straightforward manner, so I had to teach myself split filter printing. I spent several days with this one trying out different filters, and development times. A few of the windows are still solid black, but the road looks good and the overall image I think is quite nice. Of course this digital shot of the photograph is grainy and a bit flat, but you get the idea.
I miss photography. I don’t have time to set up or work in a darkroom, but the phone cam just does not quite cut it. I am not sure if I would take more pictures if I had a good camera or not. I sure would enjoy it more. Hmm . . .
Anyhow, here is the picture:
Nothing, it seems, is ever certain in the land of freelance design. Madness of Day was supposed to open mid-November and has been postponed until the Spring. That show, which was to go on with the support of SVA, has had to reschedule due to problems with the venue, currently under renovation, not being ready in time for the originally scheduled performance dates. So the Spring it is. However, I have been asked to light a show, around the same time, that is happening at FIT. So one show at a TLA educational facility for another. Funny how things work out like that!
This new show is interesting. Set in St. Thomas in the late 19th/early 20th Century addressing events surrounding the Coal-Carriers Revolt of 1892, it is a play with music. Not quite a musical, but certainly not a straight play either. The action centers around Queen Coziah who was instrumental in the revolt. The lighting inventory at the space is very limited and I have to receive a budget, so I do not yet know what this thing will look like.
This play is particularly interesting to me now as I have recently moved to a predominantly West Indian Neighborhood. Aside from a local connection, the play looks to be a fun project to work on although it will only play for two days. What interests me a lot is the way in which the dialog, music and dance all intersect. The style feels derived from the musical theatre genre, yet the song and dance is wholly organic within the piece. It in no way feels forced, a fault I often find with musicals. Staging could always change that, but on the page it reads very well. And the dance elements are equally well integrated.
On another dance note, it looks like I might be lighting a dance show in Massachusetts in December. There are some details yet to be worked out, so it is not definite, but it would be fun to get out of New York for a bit. I have not worked outside New York City since February, when I assisted on an Opera in Chicago. This January I will be assisting on an Opera in Norfolk, VA where I worked two years ago. Its a great little town, with an amazing organic coffee shop that I can not wait to go back to. Oh, and this fantastic little breakfast place that serves up a mean plate of grits.
One of my favorite things about working in other cities is getting to experience the locality for a short time. Spending a week or two in another town and finding little local treats is a fantastic experience. Becoming a “regular” for a week and building little friendships with the coffee shop staff and so forth. Finding great music stores or just wandering unfamiliar streets. That, as much as the work itself, can be infinitely enjoyable.
Moving to a new neighborhood can be a lot like those different towns. Especially in New York City, where each neighborhood can be so radically different from one another. I recently moved from one Caribbean neighborhood (Washington Heights) to another (Flatbush). Yet the differences are striking. English and French are the dominant languages here rather than Spanish. The foods are very different too. There is a strong Indian and African influence in the food and culture as opposed to Spanish.
But it is still New York. Getting out of the city and experiencing these other places is important to my work. Living around and working with people from different places and backgrounds helps to expand my understanding of humanity as a whole and consequently improves my ability to read and interpret a text for the stage. I can not imagine anything more important for an artist than travel. I feel it is important as a Human Being in general, but truly essential to the life of art.
About a week ago my 93 year old Grandmother took a bit of a fall and wound up in a hospital. A few days ago she was moved to a rehabilitation center. It was quite fortunate for the family that I was in the Bay Area to help out with this situation. Plus I got to visit her while she recuperates. Aside from me getting a little less work done than anticipated, all was well and good.
All well and good until yesterday.
It turns out that someone in the rehab center stole her wallet. Now I know that worse things can and do happen to old people, but seriously. What kind of an asshole steals from a bed ridden 93 year old woman! Its this whole current in our culture of preying upon the weak that is truly sick. Old people and children should be protected and safe.
Fuck!
. . .
I fly back to New York tonight. My flight gets in around 7am and I should have just enough time to drop my stuff off at home, shower and make a production meeting for The Children. The performance schedule is a little wacky as it is part of a festival, so here it is:
Tue 9/12 @ 8 p.m. PREVIEW
Fri 9/15 @ 8 p.m. SOLD OUT!
Sat 9/16 @ 1 p.m.
Sun 9/17 @ 8 p.m.
Wed 9/20 @ 1 p.m.
Sun 9/24 @ 1 p.m.
I then go right from the production meeting to a run through and tech for a little show at the 78th Street Theatre Lab that I got hired for last minute. The play opens on the 5th. The only person I know on the show is the stage manager, who also stage managed Cupid and Psyche.
The Innovative Theatre Awards ceremony, for which Cupid and Psyche was nominated, is coming up on the 18th. However, I may have to miss it due to lighting a dance concert, but we shall see.
Then at the end of the month I am lighting a Spanish play Twenty Years of Agnes over on 52nd street. Quite busy this month, I must say. And then we just fly right into October . . .
