DAVID MERLEAU - INDEPENDENT MEDIA ARTIST
davidmerleau [at] gmail [dot] com

URBAN TREE FESTIVAL - LOCATIVE STORYTELLING AND THE ELEPHANT ADVENTURE GLOBAL COLLABORATION

The World’s End Elephant Challenge invites you to create a 3-4 minute audio story that contemplates the emotional dimensions of global catastrophe while it explores a meaningful space for nature in our everyday lives. This story will be geolocated onto the World’s End Elephant collaborative map. The Story will be recorded simply using your cellphone Audio Recorder.

• The World’s End Elephant Challenge:
• 1. You have not seen anyone for weeks;
• 2. You encounter a clumsy elephant who befriends you;
• 3. Before the elephant leaves you, somehow she makes you feel hopeful.

CREATE: ONSITE CRAFT

  1. Go to the tree, sit for a while, observe. Open your senses;

  2. Begin your creative process;

  3. Get GPS coordinates;

  4. Take a photo of your tree. (No humans in frame.)

CREATE: PRODUCE AUDIO

  1. Record your 3-4 minute story with your Cell Phone Audio Recorder - Test it first;

  2. Record in WAV, not mp3;

  3. Find a quiet space, or one with no human noises;

  4. Submit two takes as two separate WAVs.

EXPLORE : MAKING SPACE SPEAK
Workshop - D.Merleau March 2021

  • What is a Story?
    • The roots of all storytelling mediums - Oral traditions and folktales;

    • The virtue of a shared humanity experienced by characters in a unique location. • Beginning, Middle, End;
    • The Problem, The Pursuit to Overcome Problem (tension)

  • What is a Place-Based Story?
    • Why is this place/tree important to you?

    • Help us relate to the Place: Challenge our perceptions.
    • How will the Place become its own character in your story?

    CONSIDERATIONS:

  • Through what lens will your Story “see” and how will you use it to experience this location? Biology? Poetry? Politics?

  • The Technology - Locative Media Platform - Two audiences;
    • 1. Remote user - Bring me to this Place - teleport me there;

    • 2. Local user (GPS) - Help me surrender my senses to the Place; • How do we write one story for these two audiences?

    CREATE: COLLABORATIVE STORYTELLING For the Urban Tree Festival Elephant Adventure:

    • The elephant will meet you at the beginning and leave at the end. This will allow for us to create a #followtheelephant tree tour of London.

    SUBMISSIONS

    • Upload audio to the designated Elephant Adventure cloud account, or to your own cloud account and share with davidmerleau@gmail.com.

Workshop - D.Merleau March 2021

• Send us an email and include the GPS location of your story, (a photo of the location is also welcome, and feel free to include a short bio with links to your work. This info can be added to the entry to ensure you are properly acknowledged.

• Note on tree photo: Please do not include any people in the photo.

CORRESPONDENCE - WHATSAPP

2

Workshop - D.Merleau

March 2021

  1. Go to WhatsApp settings

  2. Push QR reader button

  3. Push SCAN to include me in your contacts

3

WHATSAPP - Use to share 1. GPS Location 2. Photo of the tree
I would like it “uncompressed” so emailing or sharing via cloud drive link is best.

LOCATION SHARING - GOOGLE MAPS

  1. Go To location

  2. Drop pin

  3. Share Dropped pin page with WhatsApp or

    my email OR screenshot the GPS coordinates

Workshop - D.Merleau

March 2021

LOCATION SHARING - APPLE MAPS

Workshop - D.Merleau March 2021