Gone too Soon
Israel Hope Irby

Developed in collaboration with classmates in Professor Masha Vlasova’s experimental film class, Israel Irby’s piece confronts us with the fragility of both nature and its representations. What endures is a haunting dichotomy – cinema can hold a landscape in time, but it cannot halt its disappearance. The Park’s glaciers have lost as much as 80–90% of their area since 1966.

“Hand made on 16mm archival footage and black and clear leader, Gone too Soon explores Glacier National Park’s relationship with film. Even though film preserves nature, it is also part of the technology that destroys it. In the short, film overshadows the natural beauty of the landscape, while also being the reason we can view the park’s former glory. In this way, Gone too Soon presents a dichotomy between nature and consumption, utilising sounds from the methods used to alter the 16mm – burning, freezing, taping, cutting, scratching, painting.”