North Sea – Storebaelt Bridge. After John Constable’s cloud studies 1821. Series.

Archaeographic notes

An archaeologist might come upon an unexpected discovery. A photographer judges when to release a shutter on a moment before the camera.

Kairos is a key in archaeological and photographic engagement and mediation — kairos is actuality, the moment when things come together, in a flash of insight, of past and present, of detail and vista, figure and ground, when things fall into place in a decisive moment. Kairos is a kind of charged atmosphere of fleeting moments, comings-together.

Weather and atmosphere are key to chorography — the de-scription of milieu, of inhabitation, living systems, landscapes, seascapes.

IRIS, rainbow eye, is another divine messenger, mediator. With HERMES every message passes through thresholds, altered, tricked, delayed, misunderstood. With IRIS messages glint, sparkle, vanish; clarity is real, but fleeting, passing quickly on like clouds in northern skies.

In a series of extraordinary sketch studies of cloudy weather painted in 1821, John Constable seized such moments, freezing in paint their evanescence.