One Big Eye
One Big Eye, 2024
16mm film transferred to HD, sound, 18:08
Made in collaboration with Benny Shaffer
‘One Big Eye’ is a hand-processed 16mm film shot at Pando, an ancient grove of aspen trees that extends across 106 acres in south-central Utah. Seemingly 47,000 individual trees, it is unified by a single immense root system, making it a ‘forest of one.’ Believed to be over 10,000 years old, Pando is the largest and heaviest known organism on land. The film weaves scientific, folkloric, and mystical ways of relating to Pando. The footage was processed at home over the kitchen sink over nine months using an experimental coffee-based developer, which includes other non-toxic, domestic materials such as washing soda, vitamin C powder, and salt. We see this materially focused film practice as an opportunity to rethink ecological entanglements between us and a more-than-human world.
Credits:
Camera, edit, sound: Sobia Ahmad and Benny Shaffer
Sound Design and Mixing: Jessica Fuquay
Film Digitization: Nicki Coyle, The Negative Space, CO
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Related public programming:
A Quaking Song: One Big Eye Expanded, STUDIO for Creative Inquiry
Produced by Sobia Ahmad, Jessica Fuquay, and Benny Shaffer, this expanded cinema experience featured a projection of the hand-processed 16mm film One Big Eye with an experimental live score and storytelling performance.
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Above: A Quaking Song at the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, April 7, 2024
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This project was made possible with the generous support of the Frank-Ratchye Further Fund and The Sylvia and David Steiner Film Fund of Carnegie Mellon University.
