“The third video uses film footages to construct a sense of place: “Keep” is a film of Berwick [England] and its surroundings made up of fragments of feature fims that have used the area as a setting. Excerpts from Jean Vadim’s One More Kiss (1999), Roman Polanski’s Cul-de-Sac (1966) and Ken Russell’s The Devils (1970), amongst others, are edited together to recreate a loose narrative taking place in the same location.”

Somehow that is another version of no-place — of no sense of place as the psychogeographers would define it.

http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=23216

I am still thinking about ‘drift’ and what it means to people as different as Troels and I with respect to our spatial ability.

I didn’t even like them when I went there… . I have been there.

Your question — “is drifting helped or hurt by a sense of direction or a poor spatial memory” is provocative, because a sense of direction and a spatial memory could interfere with “drift” (as I understand it.) Spatial memory puts you into a clear abstract relationship with the 4 directions and, for example, where the ne/sw mountain range is going to. It gives direction, which seem opposite of drift.

Maybe it’s just me. I can’t conceive of a true “drift” in the sense of uncontrolled, un-thought-out movement. Perhaps it’s because I know the wind is a factor of causation, just as water runs downhill with gravity. So if one drifts on the wind or water, it isn’t exactly will-less.

So “drift” as a concept eludes my poor brain. But there are other ideas that psychogeography seems to carry with it that are less intimidating to sort through.

Will Self, in an interview on Living on Earth, says that “in order to have a profound relationship with place… you have to look for those places that choose you in that way and say ‘you know, you’re not going to be here for a day or so or a couple of days, you’re going to have an evolving, perhaps a lifetime relationship with me. I’m a place that you want to know about’ And I think, you know, for all of us who, who think about, about the world, and who think about our place in it, that that’s true. That has a resonance. And when I look back over my own life, I mean — you know, a couple of the places that I’ve come to think of as kind of ‘my places’ over the years, I didn’t even like them when I went there. It was about liking. It wasn’t necessarily about having a good time. There was something more profound going on.”

I liked this quote because it takes the concept of “drift” — just going here and there without volition or purpose — and adds to it the notion that places choose you — that your willessness doesn’t mean you won’t get stopped and forced to respond. The place will get to you, somehow.
Your composite, it seems to me, feels a bit like a teasing visual of the Place that Chose You.

It is also interesting what you said about the composite. That had not occurred to me. So far, I had thought about sticking people into landscapes without revealing too much about them - nudity of my grand children.

Water is clearly a theme and an attraction in your life, and certainly it would influence how you drift in either a known or unknown place. Actually, I think most people are drawn to water, though probably for lots of different reasons. Perhaps one aspect of it for you is that it would give you an immediate and secure sense of orientation. You can always see where you are, and can’t really get lost following a shore (no branching paths to distract you).

I again like your composite image. The technique might be a good way to express how you react to a place (memories, associations, feelings) at the same time as showing the place. Psychogeographic photography.