HD pen

HD stands for Haute Densité (High Density) but also for Harley Davidson, for this is the brand of my very European designed Sportster XR 1200 bike, made in Milwaukee, WI, USA. While riding it I will film journeys from my home (Montreuil) to the Cartography Department at the National Archives (Pierrefitte-sur-Seine) near Paris, France. This motorized sign-writing journey is showed by video, enriched by the background reading of a text discussing Jorge Luis Borges’ "On Exactitude Of Science" from A Universal Story Of Infamy (1951). In this text Borges uses the tale genre to reflect on the relation between maps and the territories they represent, and eventually raises the question of the relation between Art and Technique, Science and the empirical world. I'm continuing the idea of genuinely «writing by riding» because my ride won’t be determined by the need to reach a location point, like a GPS could help me to do it, but to draw on the map of the city letters that will make words. Through this process the motorbike becomes a pen which allows me to write directly on the territory. (Source: Luc Dall'Armellina)