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On 21 September 2018 I flew to Deer Lake Newfoundland with my partner. We picked up a Dodge Charger, and the next day found us in a parking lot near Gros Morne sheltering from a torrential downpour. It was actually quite enjoyable, like being in a carwash with brushes and foamy water flying in all directions. However, our planned hike would have to wait. I put the Charger into reverse, and there it was, an image of our wet surroundings on the backup camera’s screen, neatly framed and compellingly distorted. I once heard it said that a certain European nation was so smitten by art that its people preferred to stand in front of landscape paintings than experience the real thing. Images on a small smudged screen became our paintings, our Newfoundland, and we spent much of the vacation in reverse gear snapshotting the backup display with an iPhone. The Charger – all 4,000 pounds of it - became our camera. No focusing or aperture adjustments required, though we were provided with an unusual compositional tool in the form of two bright lines which could be bent at will by turning the steering wheel.

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