Moon Viewing Platform
Above: Trailer for Moon Viewing
A project by Nadia Hironaka & Matthew Suib with Eugene Lew, part of Moon Viewing Platform
The Moon belongs to everyone.
Moon Viewing Platform was a large-scale, collaborative and interdisciplinary public installation, that transformed a neglected stretch of open-air land into a large-scale viewing garden featuring a film projected across a 150′ wide building facade and a series of musical performances. The garden/installation was inspired by karesansui (Japanese dry landscape garden), and during its development, provided the setting for the film Moon Viewing. The film and installation invited viewers to enter another world for a moment––through the senses and the imagination––to engage in commemorative gatherings that celebrate creativity, compassion and community as essential components of human life.
The films of Moon Viewing, brought cosmological awareness to an abandoned urban fragment, a nether zone that starred as both a film set and as a viewing garden within the city of Philadelphia. Taking inspiration from the metaphysical aesthetics of the Japanese garden, particularly the karesansui, or “dry gardens” of rock and sand associated with Zen Buddhism; Moon Viewing showcased an assembly of gardeners comprised of artists, activists, chefs, musicians and the next generation of humanitarians. Some of those featured include artist, Sarah McEneaney; chef and activist, Cristina Martinez; and musician, Harold E. Smith. Designed to draw us inward, eight short stories follow the lunar phases, casting a spell of moonlight for precious moments of respite from our troubled and troubling world.
Moon Viewing Platform hosted public performances by Joshua Abrams and Natural Information Society, Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe, Anaïs Maviel, Harold E. Smith, Bismuth Quartet, Hyunjin Cha, Keir Neuringer, Keisuke Yamada, and Brooke Sietinsons / Nathalie Shapiro / Tara Burke (trio).
Moon Viewing (Excerpt) / Full Moon
Moon Viewing Platform, Performance Documentation by Christopher Andrew McDonald
