A Curatorial Residency in Berlin

Days 2 and 3 continued…

To ensure that what we were proposing remained part of the Prinzessinnen community we also proposed that at the end of each residency we would host a weekend of events.

Each artist would present the work cultivated by their respective residencies. We would also invite guest speakers to discuss topics relating to art and the notion of community. For the first weekend of events we proposed to invite Dr Helen Pheby, curator of Yorkshire Sculpture Park. She would give a seminar discussing the topic of her doctoral thesis, Making Sculpture Public. We would also invite artist Yorgos Sapountzis to give a talk entitled Collective Memory Through Public Sculptures.

On the final day of the weekend we would introduce the incoming three resident artists, one of which would be Sapountzis, the others would be Katharina Grosse and Cyprien Gaillard.

The weekend would be rounded off by a screening of Jan Svankmajer’s Alice, alluding to the utopian, magical nature of Prinzessinnengarten.

The future of Prinzessinnengarten was not something we wanted to consider head-on. Our main focus was always to find the best way to integrate art into the garden. By doing that, if we aided awareness of the garden’s troubles then that was a bonus. We did however want the residency programme to continue through the leadership of the community. It was our intention that we would be able to build a foundation, to pass on our knowledge to the community so that they could take on the role of curator and lead the residency programme after our departure.

In essence, we just wanted to plant a seed in the garden.

Not bad for two days work, I think.

Days 2 and 3

At the beginning of day two we were divided into three groups. Each group was given the assignment of devising a hypothetical proposal for a site specific event, exhibition or project at a designated location in Berlin. We would have to present our proposal at the end of day three.

Adriana Bildaru, Anna Frost and myself were assigned Prinzessinnengarten as our location. Situated on the south-east side of Moritzplatz, Prinzessinnengarten was the site of a Jewish owned department store which was demolished during the second world war. Since 2009 the land has been utilised as a community garden and also containing a kitchen, cafe and library.

Upon visiting the site the first thing we noticed was that the land was at risk of being sold for development by the council. Exploring the gardens and seeing how content people were just by being in there and having somewhere to grow crops told us how important this garden was for the city and its inhabitants. We instantly decided that anything we did here would have to be complementary and respectful to the garden. Key words that came up at that point were sustainable, subservient and integrative.

Each of us were fervent in our desire to bring art into the garden, but in a way that did not detract from Prinzessinnengarten’s overall ethos. We were also conscious that we did not want to get tangled up with the politics of saving the land but that any event were able to propose would aid awareness and bring people to the garden on a regualr basis.

After some deliberation we came to a group decision of bringing in one work of art that would sit permanently in the garden and act as the flagship to attract people there. As this was a hypothetical proposal with an unlimited budget, it was decided that work of art would be Jef Koon’s Puppy. Puppy was actually proposed by Koons to be included in dOCUMENTA 9 but was rejected, so we felt it was nice that the sculpture would now be ‘coming home’ to Germany from its current location at Gugenheim Bilbao.

The second half of our proposal consisted of a quadannual artist residency. Every three months we would invite 3 artists to spend 12 weeks working in the garden producing site-specific works that compliment the atmosphere and the spirit of Prinzessinnengarten.

Along the east wall of the garden are several shipping containers. Two of these containers house the kitchen and cafe, is used as a toilet cabin while others are used simply as storage units. We proposed that we would bring in six more of these containers to act as artist studios. These spaces could also be utilised as projection rooms or as seminar or workshop rooms for the community.

The initial three artists that we proposed to invite to the residency were Haroon Mirza, Laura Buckley and Pablo Bronstein. These artists were chosen based on their style of work and the great potential of seeing their work integrated within the garden was particularly excited.

Laura Buckley is an artist I know from working at Cell Proect Space in London. Her video works and projection installations would provide an interesting new dimension to the garden. The work she produced in collaboration with Haroon Mirza and David MacLean, Stage Fright, was one of the main points of departure for us in choosing what type of artist we wanted to invite to the residency. Pablo Bronstein’s Teatro Alessandro Scarlatti, the worlds smallest opera house was again a work that we felt would alter the dynamics of the garden without being disruptive or disrespectful.

An important part of our project was, whilst integrating art within the garden, to not impose anything or disrupt the balance of Prinzessinnengarten. Therefor, whilst the new cabins provided a kind of community centre alongside the artist studios we also had to replace a garden that was being removed due to the imminent arrival of Puppy. This garden would be relocated to the roof of the six new shipping containers and would remain fully functional.

Day 1 –

So today was the first working day of the residency. Hangovers all round (a result of last night’s welcome party) aided the group’s camaraderie in a weird way.

There are 10 residents in total, 2 of which are yet to arrive. I have decided in time I will write an individual post about each resident and their respective practices.

Today we were given a brief overview of how the 12 week programme will run. I am very excited about the prospect of visiting some of the multitude of artist studios in Berlin.

Following the inroduction we were asked to produce our first collaborative project, a kind of ice breaker. The aim of the project was to create the ‘perfect curator’. A task verging on the banal but actually extremely fun to be involved in. We were given approximately 4 hours to complete the task and a budget of 40 euros.

We each listed two words that we felt were key attributes of a curator, or what the perfect curator would possess. My suggestions were a spirit level and imperfection/flaws. The former was tongue in cheek but speaks for itself, while the latter is something I believe to be a necessity in all creatives. To be able to embrace ones mistakes is a powerful attribute in my opinion. Some of the other words listed were curiosity, practicality and my personal favourite, cultural magician. We then proceeded to group words which had some sort of connection into four categories.

Another word which stood out was vessel. We all agreed that we saw the role of the curator as being like a vessel, something/someone that channels the ideas of artists into the public realm. Based on this concept, our inital idea was to constructed some sort of water going vessel that would contain objects relating to the listed words and our idea of the ‘perfect curator’.

Confined by our limited budget, that idea developed into something more relative and less literal. Using the body as a vessel we attributed each group of words to a bodily organ and crafted an image not too dissimilar to the boardgame Operation. Developed even further we then decided to cook a meal wherby each dish would represent an organ and its attributed group of words.

The first dish was a selection of breads. These breads represented the whole body. While there are obvious connections to Christian rituals we also saw bread to reflect the words multilingual, bridge, dialogue and negotiation.

The main dish, a curry dish, represented the heart and conveyed the words curious, adventurous, seeker/traveller and cultural magician. Apples were used to represent character and the words osmosis, imperfect/flawed, open and humble. Finally, tea and coffee were served as a representation of the digestive system and the words critical/analitical, rhythm, reliability and practicality. This was also accompanied by the tag line: you don’t want to vomit art, you want to shit it out.

A very enojoyable meal and a very enjoyable first day. I will from now on be referring to myself as a cultural magician.

Although the residency doesn’t officially begin until Tuesday 18th, when we have a welcoming party for all 10 residents, today I met with 2 of the residents from the programme.

Galen Olmsted is an installation artist who studied on the MFA Cermaics course at University of Florida. Galen recently exhibited alongside my former tutor Andre Stitt at Crescent Arts Centre, Belfast.

Anna Frost is a Copenhagen based curator and a member of Toves Galleri, an artist-run exhibition space. Anna’s practice looks at collaboration between different disciplines and how this promotes an increase in dynamics. This is something I am also interested in so I am quite excited to explore our relationship over the three months.

Both Galen and Anna are very interesting people and have only made me more excited to meet the other 7 residents on the programme.

Below is the ‘Resident’s Work Plan’ as outlined on nodecenter.org – pretty comprehensive stuff!

Week 1

-welcome meeting

-workplan presentation

-presentation: residents’ previous projects

-guided visit to Berlin districts

-networking event

-welcome party with Berlin based artists

Week 2-4

-studio visist (6 artists p/week)

-art space visits (2 p/week)

-networking events (1 p/week)

-artist dossiers review

-Kunstlerhaus Bethanien presentation

-curatorial chalenges (group assignment)

-guest speakkers: curatorial strategies

-workshops: project management 1

Week 5-9

-publication: defining format and contents line

-publication: meeting with designer

-workshops: project management 2

-workshop: art vs law, contractual issues

-workshop: fundraising and grant writing strategies

-workshop: web resources for project promotion

-final project: defining concept

-final project: artist selection

-final project: technical requirements and budget

Week 10-12

-exhibition design (museology)

-exhibition: transporting and installing

-exhibition: press release

-exhibition opening

-publication: delivery of materials

-publication: final editing and printing

-publication presentation

-finissage

-exhibition review and feedback