Cities of Desire, a lyric multimedia essay by Abraham BuricksonIn October of 2009 I was thinking about cities. What makes a city a city? Is it the density? The commerce? The cultural institutions? We all know a city when we come to one - what is that? Perhaps it has something to do with desire. So one Sunday morning a few friends and I set out walking. We decided we would walk someplace new and take turns leading. The only guide was our desire. We ended up in private gardens and a flea market, a hippie commune, an antiques mall, a couple of art galleries, and a hilltop homeless enclave, among other places. Afterwards I wrote this essay - Cities of Desire (with apologies to Italo Calvino) - about what makes a city a city. What you see here are the images from our walk along with field recordings of the sounds from the city. Overlaid on all this is the essay. The walkers were: Alejandra Orozco, Robert Hudon, Cynthia Rothschild, and me (Abraham Burickson). Enjoy.
