14 Arts & Entertainment March 13th 2013 ¢ Over the Edge FLY OVER: TALKING PASSION AND PILOTS WITH LEGENDARY BRITISH COLUMBIA PHOTOGRAPHER, CHRIS HARRIS JORDAN TUCKER ART AND ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR Chris Harris has vision. In his youth, he spent time hauling himself around the world, sleeping in a tie-dyed canvas tent. Later on, he guided tours of the Bowron Lakes for 20 years, becoming an expert on the region; however, photography and a love for adventure has always been his passion, and it has paid off. A creator and self-publisher of twelve books about the Canadian outdoors, Chris has won the Northern Lights Award for Excellence in Photojournalism twice. His work has been featured in Canadian Geographic and National Geographic, and he has been honoured numerous times by regional and provincial tourism agencies. His three most recent books, Spirit in The Grass, Motherstone, and Fly Over have been hailed as seminal works on the geography and history of British Columbia, with Spirit In The Grass having been nominated for two BC Book Prizes. An avid Montreal Canadiens fan, Chris is well-respected by his peers not only for his extraordinary photographic talent but also for his extreme warmth, liveability, and observable passion. Photography and art run in the family; Chris' father was the highly talented photographer Chic Harris, and his sister, Jane O'Malley, 66 iF LY OW British Columbias Cariboo Chilcetin Coast An Aviation Legacy CHRIS HARRIS & SAGE BIRCHWATER = IR amazed to hear about pilots who, on top of flying in food and much-needed medical supplies, would wind up delivering babies Perhaps this was why the story of the aviators had gone so long without being told: no one had been willing to take a chance. is a critically acclaimed artist living and working in Ireland. The Prince George Photographic Society is hosting Chris' appearance on March 13th in the Canfor Theatre at UNBC, where he will be discussing his newest book, Fly Over. I caught up with this BC legend over the phone as he sat in his straw bale studio on his property in the beautiful 105 Mile Ranch. It was about 8 o'clock, and I apologized for the lateness of my call. It didn't matter, because Chris is often up processing images until the wee hours anyways. His photography and the creation of his images is an all- consuming passion, and Chris watches tutorials and works on his craft with a zeal most people of my generation dedicate to video games. Fly Over is Harris' latest endeavour, an incredible look at the lives and journeys of the bush pilots who essentially pioneered the Chilcotin and Northern BC regions. Fly Over paints portraits with words and images of the unsung heroes who, often at their own peril, did what needed to be done to make Northern BC liveable. Harris was in their planes. Bush pilots continue to bring forth necessary progress, flying scientists and researchers to otherwise inaccessible areas to learn more about this vital part of our landscape. “They play a hugely important role for the region as a whole, at great risks to themselves, a great group of people,” Harris remarked. The idea for book came from _ the aviators themselves. During the book presentations for Motherstone and Spirit In The Grass, people would come to Harris and introduce themselves as pilots, saying that if he ever needed to take aerial photos they would be happy to take him up. Harris didn't seriously entertain the idea until the number of pilots making the offer numbered four or five. He and his partner and business manager, Rita Giesbrecht, discussed it and realized that there was a story that wanted to be told. The aviators seemed to will the book into creation, and Sage and Chris were there to tell it for them. The risk was great: no such book like this had ever been made. The story was so niche and specific that no mainstream publisher would ever have touched it. Perhaps this was why the story of the aviators had gone so long without being told: no one had been willing to take a chance. Luckily for them, Chris Harris has always had a bit of a renegade streak. Country Light Publishing, Harris' self- created publishing company, decided to tell the story of the aviators. The book was written by Sage Birchwater, a BC landmark in his own right who has earned his salt writing the stories and history of the region. Their words and images flowed well together, telling the stories of past people and present landscapes. According to Harris, “Sage was a great guy to work with. "[We] just them like long-lost comrades. One pilot interviewed had flown more hours than anyone in Canada, having been in the sky for 42,000 hours. Harris noted that flight in such small crafts required lots of incredibly intelligent decision making, “lots of right decisions to stay alive.” The pilots themselves were adventurers, the first real colonizers of what we call home. It isn't easy, however: the supporters and storytellers of Fly Over were hit with a loss when one of their most experienced pilot friends died in a crash right around the release date. The danger was worth it to these brave pilots. Harris's photos show the reader why someone would take up such a dangerous job: the landscape viewed from above was simply staggering. What the first pilots saw and continue to see from their perch in the skies is something almost no person will ever get to witness. Stretches of green mountain, azure lakes and reddish rock: almost abstract in nature, it is hard to believe that the images Harris took weren't from a fantasy world, and were just seen from a higher plane. Harris, an unfathomably energetic person, was faced with the challenge of having to work when he could find someone to fly for him. Accustomed to picking up and going out shooting at a moment's notice, Harris was unable to make decisions around weather and temperature when creating the images for Fly Over. He was dependent on the schedule of pilots who had spare time to help him out. Even if a day wasn't necessarily fantastic, Harris had to find beauty from his seat in the cockpit. He had twenty five flights with twenty different pilots in a variety of different planes, and flew over the entire Cariboo Chilcotin, an area the size of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick combined. Harris was struck by the newer feel of the landscape from When your're sitting beside a pilot who has 66 40,000 hours of flying time, you can feel their confidence, you can feel their substance. It’s an incredible feeling to sit next to them. got along really well... He knows everyone in the Cariboo Chilcotin. [Sage] was a natural to do the book, [he] knew most of the pilots before the project began. All in all it was a great relationship.” Birchwater's stories of the pilots were interspersed with historical images of the aerial settlers of the region. Sage interviewed over 60 bush pilots, getting their stories about the joys and dangers of flying. Sometimes, according to Harris, these pilots would fly when not even birds would dare to. Many of the pilots were men who had returned from the dangers of war, only to find themselves bored with the everyday. They longed for peril and excitement, and piloting welcomed the air: “[I had] hiked, canoed, seen most of the landscapes..Seeing it from the air provided an entirely new perspective. [I] was able to concentrate more on patterns, lines, form..[It was] a very fresh perspective.” On top of the beautiful images displayed in the book, Harris also gained a great deal of respect for pilots: he experienced the passion they had for the land that they loved so much. “When you're sitting beside a pilot who has 40,000 hours of flying time, you can feel their confidence, you can feel their substance. It's an incredible feeling to sit next to them.” He described being with the experienced pilots as similar to being with an elder.