MEDIATED MEMORIES

Two swathes of blue separated by a perfect horizontal. The lighter blue above, smooth and solid. The darker below, ruffled.

Pull back.

A black woven roof. The brim of my hat. The pale blue stretches on, filling the shot. The dark blue shades to a green blue closer to the lens.

Pull back.

A grandmother stands by the sea's edge out of the waves. A father stands where the small wavelets break. Three children play around him. His children. A grandfather stands slightly off to the right. Almost out of shot - but not quite.

Pull back.

A golden sandy beach dotted with palm topped umbrellas and green beach beds. Some are peopled. Some are not. Here and there a large pebble. One bin formed from plegma.

Pull back.

Feet - well toes at least. Two smoked glass lenses. Behind them - two clear green eyes. Behind them two more lenses. They are attached to a powerful mechanism that brings a lifetime of experience to the scene. And a learned gift for analysis.

Pan left. Focus to the grandmother.

She holds to her eye a video camera.

Pan right. Centre. The father is directing the children.

Pan right.

The grandfather is too.

Centre the scene on the family picture. The children assume their previous positions and the scene unfolds again. Grandmother gives a thumbs up sign to the father. A very young girl from the group peels off and runs up the beach, past grandma, to mum - unnoticed by the camera. She grabs an airbed and rushes back into the wavelets clutching it. Look at me, she is shouting - without words. Is it her grandmother's attention she is courting or is it the camera's gaze? Whichever it is, she gets both. Grandmother stops the camera and stows it in her bag, trudging wearily back up the beach to where mum sits under an umbrella. Another batch of lies committed to digital memory. To be edited and enhanced, titled and soundtracked. False memories stored permanently. To become a part of this family's shared history.

Pull back. The camera pans left and right as it pulls back.

It hovers momentarily on a couple on a beach bed. A pretty girl in a pink bikini and headband poses her husband, white earbuds of an iPod visible, and takes a photo with her mobile phone.

Pull back and lose focus to a blur. The sound of a camera switching off. A hard drive spins down.


What have WE recorded? And HER? And THEM, the family?

We shall discuss the things that are wrong with these pictures later.