Imagine being in a forest taking pictures, slowly turning in place to record the circle around you. It is the December solstice, 2004. At the same time, 200 photographers all over the world like myself are entering the World Wide Panorama event. During a similar event in 1997 called a Wrinkle in Time, a panographer said she could almost hear the clicks of cameras as the earth turns and you chime in. I wonder how each will interpret the theme: Sanctuary. G. Donald Bain the geographer/sponsor from the University of California at Berkeley, California, said it could be public or personal. I gave the project a month, allowing the whole spiritual ecology of the place to enter a creative vision of sanctuary for the world to see.{Back to top of page}
The World Wide Panorama (WWP) site has sponsored four such events in 2004 and continues in 2005. Participants communicate primarily on two lists: a private Yahoo Group and the public QuickTime Vr group, an Apple forum.
WWP uses the Internet to create a free, global, interactive gallery.
The project fosters local conflict resolution. The Middle East Peace Edition of the World Wide Panorama is a cooperative effort by VR photographers living in United Arab Emirates (UAE), Lebanon, Israel, and Egypt. They organized, worked together and produced QTVRs that are linked together. The featured link below belongs to the web interface designer for the group. The page links to the other members.
WWP is award-winning. Yahoo! Search (UK & Ireland) named it the Find of the Year 2004, in the Travel Category. Apple lists it on its start page under QuickTime: What's On. Panoramas.dk features the site creator's entry in WWP. WiReD magazine had an interview as did VRMag.
Each year, after the competition entry period, Ars Electronica finds a theme. This year it is HYBRID--living in paradox. This theme is appropriate for the WWP (balancing local and global) and my Sanctuary entry (balancing the seen and the unseen). Even the name of my car fits doubly (see picture). It balances gasoline and electric power sources. Paradoxically or rather mysteriously, its name is Insight. A theme summary is:
"Digitization and globalization are bringing about worldwide processes of restructuring and intermingling of cultures, identities, disciplines and previously discrete fields, specialities and domains. The rapid ongoing abrogation of boundaries and fusions in art, technology and society will occupy the focal point of the 2005 Ars Electronica Festival."Visit the sites mentioned:
- World Wide Panorama (WWP) -
http://www.worldwidepanorama.org/worldwidepanorama/wwppeople/html/CarolingGeary.html See Sanctuary at WWP solstice1204 -
- Yahoo! Search (UK & Ireland) Find of the Year 2004 -
http://uk.dir.yahoo.com/Finds_of_the_Year_2004/8__Travel/- Apple Start Page - http://www.apple.com/startpage/
- Panoramas.dk - http://www.panoramas.dk
- Middle East Peace Edition -
- Prix Ars Electronica - http://prixars.aec.at/
- A Wrinkle in Time - http://www.hotspotshawaii.com/wrinkleintime/
- Caroling
- Personal sanctuary - http://www.wholeo.net/Trips/Imagine/RitualSpaces/Sanctuary/sanctuary.htm
- Sanctuary at WWP - http://www.worldwidepanorama.org/worldwidepanorama/wwppeople/html/CarolingGeary.html
- Discussion groups
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