100100 Views of Mount Fuji
C-Prints 58×74 cm / 100×130 cm / Block 40×50 cm each
Starting point of the series »100100 Views of Mount Fuji« are webcam-transmitted images accessible online. During research for the long-term webcam project »The Traveller« I discoverd a webcam in Japan’s Yamanashi prefecture that broadcasts a live view of Mount Fuji every 3 minutes.
From 2008 to 2010 I collected these web-transmitted images. A selection of the resulting archive is presented in exhibitions as large-scale photographs.
The images can be related to the work of Japanese woodblock printing artist Katsushika Hokusai. In his works »100 Views of Mount Fuji« (1834) and »36 Views of Mount Fuji« (1830–1836), Hokusai recurrently depicted Japan’s national monument and the surrounding landscapes.
The »100100 Views of Mount Fuji« are less concerned with space rather than with time. One location, one camera, one field of view, paired with constant observing, collecting and compiling.
The webcam shows a mountain, embodiment of an everlasting nature. Something that allegedly only changes over centuries. Instead, every image is different, every time. Changing daytimes and seasons generate endless variations and moods.
By day we are confronted with a familiar photographic impression. However, the more the day finally transitions into night, the more the technical aspects of webcam image creation become visible: the webcam (more specific: the software in use) continues to generate images despite of the fading light. The results become rugged and show increasing disturbances and artefacts. The visual information seems to dissolve and vanish.