About this Talk
Throughout the decades that Pete Mauney has been making images in the dark, one thing that kept bringing him back is a fascination with systems and time and how they can be represented and recorded at night. Whether it is fireflies in the summer or air traffic patterns in the winter, he is obsessed with how they interact with the human and natural landscapes.
Working the northeastern U.S. skies, day or night, means one thing for sure: human air traffic. While understandably the bane of many (visually/environmentally/epidemiologically/etc.), Pete has found a transcendent beauty and even human drama that can be seen in the busy skies. Cumulative visualization through hours-long exposures reveals the intricacies of the complex web of human activity overhead. The result can sometimes be almost musical. Embodied in the images is evidence of the beauty of human ingenuity and collaboration.
Does Pete wish for dark skies without aircraft and/or satellites? Without cell towers or power lines? Absolutely. But he sees his role, his training, his basic nature, is to record what he finds visually and socially compelling as it exists in the world, and follows that where it leads. Often to Newark Aiport.
Please fasten your seatbelts, place your trays in the upright position and prepare for take-off. This might get a little bumpy!
