Writing / Collection 01

City & Fieldwork

Edmonton Observer: essays and field notes on the ordinary systems, objects, and gatherings that make a city.

Selected excerpts from the Edmonton Observer body of work.

Observational essay

Temporary Populations

A festival, more than one hundred and eighty traffic cones, and a temporary population entrusted with making the evening possible.

Excerpt / Paige C. T. Croucher

I had intended to photograph the festival.
Instead, I found myself photographing traffic cones.
This seemed, at first, like poor judgement. Festivals generally provide musicians, dancers, food, lighting, and several thousand people who have all made a conscious decision not to resemble traffic cones.

About the field study

Essay · Public gathering

Fireworks (Canada Day)

An observation of a shared evening, its sounds, and the intervals that seem to hold part of the experience.

Excerpt / Paige C. T. Croucher

Neither seems to exist entirely within the notes themselves. The intervals appear to be doing a surprising amount of the work.

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