We’ve been waiting on Ken Burns' latest project for more than a year now, and it’s finally time to make the popcorn and turn on the television. The National Parks: America’s Best Idea is slated to air later this month on your local PBS station. The film took nearly a decade to create, and we’re ready to witness some breathtaking imagery as well as learn a little something. We might actually want to take a few notes so we don’t miss anything good—it could come in handy for trivia night at the local bar.

The documentary begins with the birth of the national park and traces its evolution over the years through modern times. Burns uses first person accounts, old photographs, and over 40 interviews to illustrate where the country’s greatest treasure has been and where it plans to head in the future. There are plenty of contemporary anecdotes juxtaposed with the historical accounts throughout the film, so it won’t be just a lecture on what has been. ]]> kjb 2009-09-18T10:36:12-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2006/7/24/171929/794
Blue Chevigny and Flynn Larsen's You Are Here Project is a cross-country examination of social networks and the ways that geography and life intertwine.

This is how the You Are Here Project works: its producers drove across the country (from New York City to California) in two installments, interviewing people along the way. Their path was determined not by sightseeing prerogatives but by the friendship networks of the people they interviewed. Interviewee A asked prospective interviewee B, some distance to the west, if he or she would mind being interviewed, and the journey unfolded. The You Are Here Project's rules are geared toward moving the project along.

Chevigny, who used to be a producer at NPR's This American Life, and Larsen, a New York-based photographer, began the project in 2005. In their 2005 stretch, they traveled from New York to Indianapolis. In June and July of this year, they resumed their journey in St. Louis, and finished up in Escalon, California.

The 2005 interviews appear on the You Are Here Project site. The interviews conducted earlier this summer remain unedited. Happily, Chevigny and Larsen have set up a blog, with text, photos, and audio clips, to provide a preview of the finished project.
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