Water Over Stone No. 2, 2019 (excerpt)
Running time: 14:50 minutes / HD / colour

Repeated movements of water moving over a stone in Lake Memphremagog in the Eastern Townships.

Camera: Sylvia Safdie
Editting: Patrick Andrew Boivin, Sylvia Safdie
Audio: Silent

“To gaze at a river made of time and water
and remember Time is another river
To know that we stay like a river
Our faces vanish like water.” *

*The Art of Poetry
By Jorge Louis Borges

Breath – the rhythm of time

While gazing at the currents in Lake Memphremagog, without realizing it, I became captivated by the flow of water over a stone. It was a windy afternoon, and the water kept gushing in rhythms of swirls as it intervened with the stone, or was it the stone that intervened with the flow of water… However it was the stone that I identified with – my body became one with the stone, and I was enveloped by its folds, wrinkles, and ripples. When I became conscious of the experience I ran to get my video camera.

Every once in a while, you come across an image or a passing moment that is insightful; so full of wonder and grace that is impossible to articulate what it is about (without stripping it of its splendour) because it is about everything. I feel gratitude for those moments.

This video was shown at the exhibition As I walk at the Fonderie Darling, Montréal, in 2021.