the lancaster manifesto

THIS IS LANCASTER.

it shall be a realm of disaster, destruction, and diplomacy between the natural and the constructed. it will be a world of life hidden beneath crumbling facades, and culture behind closed doors. it will be revealed through the lens of a camera, and it will be seen through the eyes of the foreign photographer. it will be shaped through art and decay, through new growth and the changes time brings. it is a world of green and gray. it will be a place on the beach, just by the water's edge, constantly reshaped by the hand of time. and in its constant change lies a people of constant nature, seen only in its multitude of layers with the art that courses through its veins. it is the yin and yang, a balance of creation and destruction, a child of shiva's own nature, constantly created and destroyed and rebuilt over and over again. it will be staunch and unchanging, yet ever shaped and reshaped. it shall be revealed in the art of the foreigners, and it shall be shaped by the art of the foreigners. it will be lancaster, and it will be influenced by us, but never quite ours. it is a river, always there but never quite the same from minute to minute. to know the place is to destroy the place, and to know the place is to reshape the place, and to know the place is to create the place. one must be the grass creeping through the sidewalk cracks, destroying and reshaping and creating new surfaces and new facades. one must become the vines that creep along the walls, blanketing their faces and dressing up dull brick patterns. one must understand that with the passage of time, the flowers that currently adorn the wrought iron fence will one day consume and destroy it. change is the core element of its existence, and consistency is what continues it on through time. this is lancaster, and it is defined through the artist and the resident and the nature that will forever flow through the cracks of this mosaic of culture and history. even that which is written in stone will someday fade.