One of the obvious elements of tall bike
riding is that you are high up - you can see over things. Many tall lefties will argue that this is an
advantage in traffic where the rider can see over cars, allowing them to
continue their righteous forward cycling movement unhindered. This may be somewhat true but what they are
not telling you is the other stuff they can see over – like fences. This experience is clear to me and it got me
thinking about privacy, voyeurism and things like Google Earth and Google
Street View. These things are changing
the way we consider our privacy. It may
seem trivial but I’m sure we have all done that thing where we try and view
someone’s house via satellite, be it our own or someone else’s. We are all inherently aware of Google Street
View and have played with it in some way or other. There are artists who have approached this
idea in various ways. I would note my
favorites as Jon Rafman’s 9 eyes project in which he trawls through Google
Street View pictures looking for personal and aesthetic anomalies. Melanie Coles’ Where On Earth is Waldo? is a
lighthearted approach to the same conversation.
In my case, I have decided to make a DIY
Google Street View. I have made an arm
that fixes to my handlebars with a camera at more or less eye height, recording
what I see whilst riding my tall bike.
With this in mind I have set out to extend my portrait project by making
a portrait of my suburb, using my DIY Google Street View.
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