Meadows Back (11 min. 2007) Directed, shot, and edited by Lester Alfonso for the Back Meadows Music Festival Peep Show screening event in Peterborough, ON.
Reporting from my desk, on this the 42nd day of daily posts, I offer these words and the retrieval of these video artifacts from the vault as “news.” I’m a digital archeologist and I’ve unearthed something historic; it’s a document of a time and place that can now only live in our memories. I’m an auto-ethnographer, documentarian, and humanitarian.
I’m a “journalist’’ because I do this every day. I’ve been writing my reports every day since 2014. Before that, I would have sporadic bursts of journaling and writing since 1988. I have several banker’s boxes full of words and pictures.
The word journalism is taken from the French journal which in turn comes from the Latin diurnal or daily. The Acta Diurna, a handwritten bulletin, was put up daily in the Forum, the main public square in ancient Rome, and was the world’s first newspaper.
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Now is the time to turn each page of this Magnus Opus into an origami sailboat and set each one adrift in the upstream. I admit that I’m only offering my biased impressionistic reportage but so is everybody else. This is me owning up to my “brand.” This is a story about self-acceptance.
This document from twelve years ago has only been seen once before so this would mark its digital worldwide premiere. It was Michael Morritt who approached me in 2007 with the idea of submitting a short film to the event he was putting together at the Gordon Best Theatre in Peterborough called BMFF Peep Show — in honour of The Back Meadows Music Festival.
I was there at Back Meadows in 2006 with my video camera, as usual. I took the opportunity to put something together and came up with what I’m publishing today for the first time ever: Meadows Back. Eternal return, I kept thinking as I edited. Visually, it’s experimental. The short clipped audio edits are intentional.
At the time, I was concerned with the idea of triggering memories without offering images and sound to replace those same memories. It’s just like how looking at a film negative does not replace the image in one’s head but triggers an internal image in the mind instead.
At the screening in 2007, when I was asked to introduce the film, I said: “This movie is my impressionistic take of what it’s like to have a psychedelic mushroom trip at the festival.” It got the laugh that I wanted from the audience but this was not exactly the truth.
The truth is that I wanted to position the film for the audience and prime them for what they were about to see. I wanted to capture something other than what’s traditionally captured at a backyard festival.
For all the talk about Truth and Journalism, I adhere to the maxim I learned from the Biology of Story course: all stories are true for those who tell them in the places they are told. More soon! — LA
P.S. If you’re liking these daily posts, perhaps you can consider becoming a monthly donor for a year or making a one-time contribution. It would seriously help a lot. Your money goes directly into supporting an artist committed to continually become the best version of himself. Thank you so much! Much love, LA