Top Five Double Edge Photos
A recollection of self-reflection
Double Edge’s internship program offers administration and production opportunities to people looking for something different and interested in a deep, inside learning experience about how Double Edge functions day to day. Kim Chin-Gibbons, a musician, photographer, and soon-to-be college freshman, has spent 18 months with us as a Marketing Intern.
During the winter of 2016, I came to Double Edge as a musician for the Ashfield Town Spectacle Open Sessions. I had also recently found a love of photography and soon found myself with a camera in my hands to capture the heart of the community’s exciting summer project.
Soon after the Open Sessions I was invited to become an official photographer for their Ashfield Town Spectacle. To my surprise, I was then hired as a marketing intern in the fall of 2017, and pulled into the world of the company. So many opportunities in the past two years have crossed my path; not only photographing things like action-packed training programs and spectacles, but a vast insight on the internal operations of the company itself. Creating campaigns with a team, contributing my photography and ideas to Double Edge’s visual representation, and learning to manage my own projects are just a few of the things that have shaped my individuality as an artist.
In a nutshell, Double Edge has turned my world inside out.
During the fall of 2018, I was asked to pick my top five photos taken at Double Edge as a project for my marketing internship. Of course this turned into an off and on project, and every time I revisited it, there was newer and more exciting work to replace the top five photos with. Over the course of my time here I have captured thousands of photos, and eventually I realized I needed to focus on the moments that haven’t left my head since I hit the shutter button. In result, I believe these photos capture Double Edge and my shutterbug journey with them so far.
This first moment is from the 2018 Spectacle Immersion, for the production We The People. People often learn how to fly in both training programs and special sessions for performances. From swinging on silks, bungee jumping, and soaring on the trapeze, Double Edge embraces the opportunity to fly in any fashion. This session was challenging in the field because the wires would often swing through the frame, and timing was absolutely everything when it came down to the click of the camera.
The picture not only captures a Spectacle Immersion artist in flight; it shows just how daring people at Double Edge really are. Opportunities like flying aren’t just rare occasions that happens at the time of a performance, those kinds of experiences are embraced and made accessible to people of all levels. During the Spectacle Immersion my photography soared to new heights as I got to witness people giving it their all, and diving right into the excitement of that summer program on the Farm.
Next up is a more recent photo from the 2019 Winter Intensive. A lot of training programs are lively with an overwhelming cluster of movements, and it can be hard to keep up with everyone in action. Even though it’s hard for me to admit, a fair amount of training photographs come out with a combination luck and the camera’s willingness to focus. However, this was not just a lucky shot. This was one of those moments where the photo came out just like I was picturing in my head. My intentions were the clearest they had ever been during this winter training program with years of experience under my belt.
This part of the session was a two-at-a-time dance, while the other participants and leaders awaited their turn to grab a partner and dance across the room. I knew I wanted to capture the movements of two people moving together, but there was also the flying of hair, those focussed and undisruptable facial expressions, and precision of a true frozen moment in time that I wanted the image to embody.
At the beginning of my Double Edge photography journey, it was an uphill battle getting photos to conform to what I saw behind the camera. I soon began to realize that the more images I captured with clarity and intention, the more my vision would succeed in its path.
Going now into the fall of 2018, rehearsals for Double Edge’s first-ever autumn spectacle Leonora’s World took place in many different types of light. When I shot the previous spectacle during the summer I had become aware of the harsh daylight containing heavy shadows. We normally see daylight with such optimism and purity, but it can also be a camera’s worst nightmare with the bright rays fluctuating their power, and having to change settings constantly. In the summer, I had begun to use certain parts of it to my advantage, and I took that knowledge to this spectacle in the fall.
At this spot on the farm around mid-day, the light filters through the trees, and with enough light you can get a lens flare containing the pattern coming through the tree leaves. As soon as I saw the light shine through my lens, I knew I wanted to try the same mystery I had discovered over the summer, and this was the result.
Following the autumn spectacle was a Farm showing of Leonora & Alejandro: La Maga y el Maestro in November of 2018. I remember documenting this particular show during it’s early rehearsal process in 2017, which was my first year as an intern with the Theatre. I remember seeing the evolution of the project scene by scene, and I had photographed the show on tour at Peak Performances at Montclair State University.
During this performance was the first time I had two cameras I alternated with between scenes, and I felt a strong obligation to capture every moment, knowing the show as well as I did. Throughout it all I had reshots of scenes that both I and other photographers had captured, but this was a photo where I saw something without the pressures of having to capture something “amazing” with my perfectionistic mindset. In this photo, I can almost hear the humorous and amusing dialogue of their relationship. Photographing this show was important milestone that taught me not to negatively press myself about what I create.
During the promotional process of Leonora & Alejandro, I had been keeping up with the design of things like graphic materials, construction of the show’s presentation on social media, and general promotional needs. I would work with the Double Edge Marketing Team on these matters and contribute my ideas. Even when I pitched ideas that didn’t work, those setbacks would propel me forward because I would learn how to adjust and redo the work handed back to me. I learned to never shy away from my vision and also meld any feedback and disagreements to make my work stronger. Because of this, I owe all of my future discipline towards my art to the stages of editing and critiquing throughout the promotional process.
And at last, this photo is from the 2018 Winter Intensive training program. Since photographing trainings were a relatively new thing for me, I became fascinated with capturing a photo that was more like painting a picture; a photo that tells a story in what looks almost like a completely new medium. I began to make long exposures in order to bring movements to life in a fresh, more vivid way than I had been doing before.
This picture was born out of a training with the entire group continuously rotating in a circle. Whenever circle work happens in training, it takes a strenuous effort in order to snap people’s expressions within their experience, and trying to shoot during that results in a lot of back-shots.
When everyone began stomping in the circle I fumbled with my settings and tried to fill the frame with as much of the energy in front of me as I could. At about my second or third try this photo came out and that was the beginning of my journey of light painting training.
Below are some more light paintings I wanted to include in this top 5, from the summer of 2018, and winter of 2019.
And while speaking of photos that didn’t make the top 5 cut, from Artistic Immersion programs to special events on the Farm, here is a handful of the many I wanted to squeeze in.
