minka

A film about place and memory, a farmhouse in Japan, and the lives of the people who called it home.

A beautiful short film about John Roderick, an Associated Press reporter in Japan, and his discovery of an old farmhouse in Japan. He and his adopted son Yoshihiro Takishita, an architect and antique dealer, transported and restored the farmhouse in a suburb of Tokyo. Shot just a month after the death of Roderick, the film looks at the memories within the walls of the minka farmhouse (via Ignant).

[vimeo vimeo.com/20658635 w=500&h=400]

The Streets of Tokyo

[vimeo vimeo.com/7892412 w=500&h=400] This video by Vincente + Sara of the streets of Tokyo is serene, lovely and full of slow movement. It makes me want to visit again, to see again the small things hidden within the bustling city. But I actually debated whether to post this video because it's essentially a promotion for Zara, which was one big chaotic mess last time I was there. Here's to the hope that good advertising erases a blah experiences (via GOOD).

Captured

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOvZAxAN9ng&hl=en_US&fs=1&] Over the weekend I watched this documentary about the artist Clayton Patterson, self-appointed visual historian of the Lower East Side subculture since the early 1980s. He started documenting daily life through photography and picked up video in 1986 when the handheld camcorder came onto the scene.

"Realizing the unlimited potential of video he quickly rode a new wave into a world of politics and activism, employing documentation as a tool to combat corrupt authority, corporate takeover, and eventually gentrification."

- Rebel with a Lens in The Brooklyn Rail

He amassed over 100,000 photographs and over 10,000 hours of video, mostly famously his footage of the police brutality in the Tompkins Square Park riots. In a New York Times multimedia feature, Patterson describes some of his photos and the now-gone scene.