Residency at HomeBase V Berlin

What is permanence? What is it described in relation to? Factors that are temporary, or also, to one extent or another, permanent? Can permanence exist in isolation?

PERMANENT, definition:

continuing or enduring without fundamental or marked change: stable

— per·ma·nent·ly adverb

— per·ma·nent·ness noun

Examples:

She made a permanent home in this country.

Prolonged exposure to the sun can cause permanent skin damage.

The museum’s permanent collection includes works of art from the 18th century.

The transcripts will serve as a permanent record of the proceedings.

TEMPORARY, definition:

lasting for a limited time

— tem·po·rar·i·ness noun

Examples:

The drug will give you temporary relief from the pain.

The delay is only temporary.

The settlers built temporary shelters.

Source: Merriam Webster http://www.merriam-webster.com

Tuesday 31 August. Day two.

Finally managed to catch up on sleep.

Discovered that the wireless works in my room, so pleased.

About 5 cups of tea already consumed.

Found out I have been nominated for the Future Map art prize. Amazing.

Goint to the Lomo store in a sec.

Monday 30 August. Day one.

One hour sleep the night before the flight.

Still dazed, I got a bus and a tram, and after 5 mins walk I found the place. I’m glad I’m good at maps.

There are two building blocks facing each other. One is the working space -the studios, with a kitchen and everything. The other is the living space, a fomer hostel?

When shown into my room I am completely shocked at the size -I have my own living room and a bedroom.The showers currently have no hot water, and it’s freezing.

The studios looks like a building site more than studios, but the idea is for us, the artists, to inhabit thei space over the period of the residency. Each artist has their own room (or shared if it’s a large space). Mine looks surprisingly similar to what I invisaged it would be like. The size is managable and seeing that I don’t usually make my work in the studio it works well for me.

We went to the ‘store’, just around the corner. A large warehouse type of space (I think that’s the former bus station) filled floor to ceiling with stuff -all kinds of stuff that we can borrow for our needs and then return at the end of the show. It’s creepy… It’s all the stuff basically ‘sweeped’ from peoples homes, those who were late paying their house fees? That’s what I understood from one of the volunteers anyway.

There are things like chairs and tables and books, but also things like a rocking horse and family photos, opened pack of pasta and food leftovers on the spatula and the frying pan… I finished off my first 120 film there and then, within about 10 mins. Hope they come out well.

I decided to photograph the spaces I was allocated (the studio and the room) as I inhabit them throughout the residency… those will hopefully become part of the final installation.

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Went to see what’s on at Guggemheim (good) then to a talk by John Bock at a temporary art space that is about to close. Amazing cakes in their bar, but the talk was in German… of course.

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It’s freezing outside and in the rooms. Top of the shopping list -hot water bottle. The off to the Lomo store.

Books to order directly to my address in Berlin:

Theodor W. Adorno – Aesthetic Theory

David Morgan – With Love and Rage: A friendship with Iris Murdoch.

It’s 14:15 in London and I still need to pack. My flight is at 7am tomorrow, thankfully from Heathrow, which is 10mins drive from my house. Doesn’t look like I’m getting much sleep tonight.

During the past two weeks I have been battling with the German embassy over my visa, instead of recovering from my eventful time in Israel (details would take up a whole other blog’s worth of writing…). Finally, the day after my original flight on 27 August I received my passport with the visa. Hence, having booked my new flight last night I am still packing at this stage.

The tricky part of it all is equipment. Most of my work relies of video cameras and computers. I have borrowed a very nice HD camera from a friend (thanks Chris!) but have no laptop… I have always been ok working on my desktop, and, to tell the truth, wouldn’t have it any other way. Resolution: I need to have both. But until then, I’ll have to do with what I actually own…

The idea of HomeBase, now in it’s fifth year, is to bring together artists from different countries on the basis of their response to the idea of Home. Each artist was also asked to donate a piece of work. I decided to submit two photographs taken with my Holga cam a couple of years ago. One in my home in Tula, Russia, and one here in London. The idea was to investigate installation in domestic environment, also referring to art installation -or what we call immersive installation. Although the art installation assumes ‘someone else’ as the inhabitant, I found that there are a lot of similarities between the two and especially in how we place ourselves within those. The art installation is made with the visitor in mind and how they would navigate the space. A domestic ‘installation’ relies on similar rules. Is there space for chance in these? For disorder*?

I decided that I will set myself a series of tasks or rules over this residency. While going through and selecting the images for donation I realised that I’d like to work with still photography more than I have done in the past couple of years. At the same time I find that writing is becoming more important in my work.

With this in mind, I should go and pack.

*not mess