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Artist's Date
The idea of an artist's date is to broaden artistic horizons and challenge aesthetic comfort zone. Seeking inspiration and knowledge. Julia Cameron has introduced the concept of an artist's date in her book The Artist's Way. She describes the date as a tool to recover one's creativity.
Connecting to the artistic piece
The artist date is the opportunity to open yourself up to insight, to inspiration, to guidance. To feed your creative consciousness. To challenge your creative consciousness and to stretch your aesthetic horizons!
What happened to you? How did you respond – emotionally, analytically, physically?
Elina Simes
Ezgi Tatar
Elin Bergdal
Clara Horbach
Christa Coogan
Connecting to the space
Try to take yourself to a range of different spaces. These could be a somewhere in nature, a square in the middle of a city or a cultural space such as a library or museum. Just exploring different settings.
Commit to spending some time there, like a date, but with yourself. During that time, really try to connect with all of your senses; listen to all of the sounds, feel all the sensations in your body, tune into smells and scents, connect with any tastes and observe the details of what is happening around you. Do you notice any patterns in the sensations that make you feel something? Inspire you?
This is a practise of mindfulness – to connect with a space or situation on a deeper, holistic level.
Clara Horbach
A Thousand Splendid Suns
Audio book
Author: Khaled Hosseini
Reader: Atossa Leoni
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Lately I have fallen in love with all kinds of spoken media. I listen to podcasts and audio books all the time, a bit too much, even. (When you can't even go to the shower without listening to someone speaking, you have gone a bit too far, I think.) A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, read by Atossa Leoni, was probably the most breathtaking piece of literature for a while. As an Artist date this book wasn't the source of fun, whimsical creativity, but more of a serious, sad, makes-me-think-about-my-life sort of experience.
I found the story to have two important layers. The first is the near history of Afghanistan seen through the city of Kabul. The story spreads over three decades and includes the Soviet invasion and the reign of the Taliban. The second layer is the people who witness all the war and destruction – two women, who are the main characters in the book. It's painful to read about all the suffering, all the years wasted, all the future plans trashed. The hatred and despise these women have to endure is just too much.
So how this piece of art made me feel? Throughout the book I was angry. Angry at this government and the state the world is in, and how it affects especially women and children. When the story starts in the 1980's, Kabul is a city where women go to universities, work as doctors and teachers and can choose if they want to cover or not. Religion is what I think it is supposed to be – a source of strength for the people who need it. I'm not saying that the country of Afghanistan was a perfect place for women, but when the story goes on, this old Kabul felt like a paradise. The Soviet invasion wasn't good for Afghanistan, but it wasn't all bad either, since it promoted this equality between men and women.
I still feel devastated thinking about the young main character, Laila, who had her whole future ahead of her – career plans, love, family – and who was robbed from all of these things, lied into marriage, oppressed under domestic violence and forced to stay behind closed doors and cover herself. Everything that happened to her was executed by violent, power-hungry men. While feeling angry and sad, the story also makes me feel extremely lucky to be born in a country that values equality (although we just had the elections here in Finland and the extreme right wing had again a huge share of the votes, which is super scary).
It's hard to find anything good in the Taliban regime, when reading about it from the perspective of two women. Women were forced to cover all the times and weren't allowed to leave their homes without a male relative. Women were banned from working and having an education. Literature, music, dancing, cinema, visual arts and most of the sports were forbidden, and all the material was destroyed. In the story the young woman Laila is pregnant and goes into labour during the Taliban regime. In Kabul there was only one hospital that treated women, they didn't have any medicine, anesthetics or disinfectants, and the female doctors were supposed to operate in burqas. They perform a C-section to Laila.
As a piece of literature, the book was highly educational for me, whose knowledge of Afghanistan is based on the speeches of George W. Bush after 9/11. After listening to the book, it was very satisfying to look up all the things that happened, and to actually see pictures (it wasn't satisfying but horrible) of these events. Although the personal stories of these women are fictional, all the political events are real. For example, the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan was a completely new information to me, and made me think about the fire of Notre Dame. Long story short: The Buddhas of Bamiyan were two very large statues in central Afghanistan, carved into a side of a cliff in 507-554 CE. They were listed as a UNESCO World heritage site. The Taliban blew them up, destroying both statues completely in 2001. One would think that the destruction was carried out because of the religion – since the buddhas are artifacts of a non-islamic religion, they were dynamited down. However, the Taliban regime stated, that they were offered money to restore the statues heads, which were in a bad state. The country was extremely poor, and in a severe need of food-aid, and the government asked if they could use the money to feed the children instead. Since the interest was to put money to the buddhas and not to the people of Afghanistan, the Taliban decided to destroy the statues as a protest. This isn't of course a sensible way to deal with famine and extremely old piece of art, but it made me think about the Notre Dame fire, and the amount of money that other countries and people were immediately ready to give to restore the church. Where is this willingness to help when it comes to immigrants, famine and the environment?
A couple of words about the experience of listening a book instead of reading: The reader affects the experience a lot, and if I don't like the reader, the book is ruined. Atossa Leoni was absolutely perfect. She is an Iranian-Afghan-German actress and listening her pronouncing the names and words perfectly (well, how do I know if it's perfect, on the other hand) was beautiful. I'm glad that the reader was a woman and had an Afghan heritage – it deepened the experience and immersion. I just love to listen to stories. The piece of literature feels more distant, since I'm not reading it with my own inner voice, but at the same time I feel the art of the words more present, when I'm listening to somebody reading it with care and seriousness. As an adult I rarely get any bed-time stories read to me (although it happens sometimes), and I find listening to spoken word very soothing.
Pina
Documentary
Pina - Movie (2011)
Genres: Documentary
Director: Wim Wenders
Cast: Includes 41 dancers who danced with Pina Bausch
Why did I choose Pina:
I have two reasons for choosing this movie: First of all, I work seven days in a week for a while. When I read the artist date assignment, I decided to go an opera or a contemporary dance piece. But unfortunately couldn’t find the tickets for both! In Ä°zmir when they start to sell tickets for opera, it’s all sold in a minute! Good for Ä°zmir, not good for me!! J (It was Carmina Burana by Carl Orff…) The same happened for contemporary dance piece. And I didn’t want to be so late for the assignment, so the idea of writing about Pina came to my mind. When I started to attend Orff Schulwerk workshops, take creative dance classes, I was looking for materials for me to understand deeply Orff Schulwerk. I was feeling like a tabula rasa; an empty plate. Then I heard about Pina somehow and watched the movie. I was deeply moved by the movie, the scenes and music, the quality of each dancer’s movement and choreographies – I found it so expressive and I think, after Pina I started to look differently at my teachers in movement classes. I tried to listen more carefully and tried to do more deeply what they ask to me. So, these hitches enabled to choose Pina!
About Pina Bausch:
Pina Bausch was born 1940 in Solingen. She received her dance training at the Folkwang School in Essen under Kurt Jooss, where she achieved technical excellence. Soon after the director of Wuppertal's theatres, Arno Wüstenhöfer, engaged her as choreographer, from autumn 1973, she renamed the ensemble the Tanztheater Wuppertal. Under this name, although controversial at the beginning, the company gradually achieved international recognition. Its combination of poetic and everyday elements influenced the international development of dance decisively. Awarded some of the greatest prizes and honours world-wide, Pina Bausch is one of the most significant choreographers of our time. (By Norbert Servos/Translated by Steph Morris) (http://www.pinabausch.org/en/pina/biography)
About the Movie:
After the sudden death of Pina Bausch in the summer of 2009 - in the middle of joint preparations before shooting - Wim Wenders, after a period of mourning and reflection, had to rethink and start again with his film about and with Pina Bausch. This movie is a tribute to her. This movie was filmed for Pina, the actors are her dancers actually. Pina’s dancers describe Pina and they share their memories about her. At the same time there are four dance pieces here, mixed together.
What I see, what I feel about Pina:
The movie starts with an empty stage, and then a woman appears barely. She is standing in the center. We here a music, then slowly we see her closely. What is interesting about her is, she has a big accordion which is tied to her and that closes her special parts - she is not wearing anything else! Such a strong picture for starting the film! Then she starts saying words about seasons and for each season she has descriptive words When she says these key words, she also accompanies them with movement: Spring: grasses; summer: the sun and growth grasses; autumn: the falling leaves; and winter: no words, just squeeze and shaking hands as she is cold. Then, she just says the seasons and does the movements in her spot. Suddenly all the dancers appear upstage walking in a diagonal line coming downstage. Now they are closer to the audiences and it feels like they are introducing themselves one by one like saying “Hello!” They are also making the same movements about seasons in the same coordination with the woman who is still standing in the middle. I thought it is a very strong starting to see each of them by walking slowly.
In the next scene a woman is lying on the sand but she has a red dress under her. She starts moving – as an awakening of a woman… what was happening afterwards just made me think about social pressure in our society. The relationship between woman and man, how it should be (that we learn actually…) Here in Turkey people don’t talk or show their feelings to the other gender, but they are very interesting about what other people are doing! Because of this pressure, women cannot open their feelings to someone, because it is not a nice behavior for society. When a lady who is wearing red dress is dancing with a man, these thoughts appeared in my mind.
One of the dancers says, “Working with Pina is like finding a new language, she taught me a new way to express myself, then I forgot the words!” What an impressive saying!
Then we see suddenly different scene, a woman who is wearing long black dress (why is she wearing black? Is she sad about something?) with the red dots (gives me signals of love) walks like blind, slowly but she doesn’t seem like she is aware of what she is doing. She walks towards a man, that man follows her wherever she goes. When they come closer she releases herself with facing position to the ground…When she is super close to the ground – he takes her weight and supports her to stand again… So many thoughts appear in my mind… Also - releasing body in facing position to the ground, effortless and calm, such a deep expression. By the way, she was so close to kiss the ground! J I asked myself, how far can you go???
Cafe Müller…I love the stage, full of tables and chairs organized randomly. The chairs, very strong element! The colours of the scene is black and grey, two woman dancers wearing white, men are wearing black suits… Here we hear Pina’s voice; she says “Once I danced Cafe Müller with closed eyes, it was totally different. Then a very big feeling appeared. This is a vital subject, every little detail is so important”.
What I remember about the other scenes: I liked the parts that were filmed outside, into the real life. One of the scenes, one woman dancer with ballet shoes was dancing in front of an industrial zone. As a first impression I liked the background is full of metals and pipes and building – it is a contrasting feeling to the audience but in a few minutes I got bored of looking at these buildings… This is just what I feel.
I would like to mention about the elements Pina had chosen, the sand! And the water for instance, real materials on the stage and when you see these elements you say “Really?” They are REALLY playing with water, rolling on the real sand. THIS makes me feel like it is a part of normal life, not like a stage…
One of the dancers mentions that Pina taught them to stand back of their mimics, movements and steps… I think this is what makes interesting a dance, music or a theatre piece: Taking care of every little detail on the stage.
At the end of the movie, we see a recording of Pina an empty and dark stage, she is dancing in black dress and waves her hand like saying goodbye.
Les Miserables
Musical
I’ve always liked musicals especially the more ”classical” ones. Les Miserables is a story about life - death, love - hate, hope - despair and above all I think a persons own view on honor, loyalty and duty. I love the fact that the story doesn’t have a clear good and bad guy in the end. The obvious villain in this case would be the policeman Javert, who is hunting down the main character Jean Valjean. But by the end of the musical you see things from Javert’s perspective, how true he is to his calling and pursuit to obtain the law in an unstable France.
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Another theme of the musical is hope, even if life has dealt you a bad hand, one act of mercy and charity can change your path and lead you to a better life. During my time in Sweden I haven’t had time to go to concerts or art-performances, when I sat down in my chair and the orchestra started playing I remembered why art and culture is so important. Everyone needs a break from their life, their perspective. During a performance you can dive into someone-else’s story, reflect, feel and have epiphanies of your own.
I enjoyed how the dance and movement worked together with the music. My favourite part of the choreography was when they danced at a wedding and the lighting brought the dancer’s shadows up towards the ceiling. It felt like their bodys were dancing on the floor and their souls danced above them. Also how they used their facing was very effective during the choreography.
One thing I felt the actors had a hard time executing was moving in slow-motion. The goal was to make a hard change between moments in slow-motion versus normal movement. I instantly thought of Laban and the fact that slow, soft movement and stillness needs to be just as filled with energy as fast, explosive movement. This applies also in singing, pianissimo needs even more work from the body than forte.
Overall I liked the musical and how it brought both goosebumps and more philosophical reflection about life itself.
King Arthur
Opera
King Arthur – a semi-opera (1691)
music by Henry Purcell
libretto by John Dryden
version for the Gärtnerplatztheater München by Torsten Fischer
About my choice and the piece:
I am not very familiar with operas. But lately I go more often to performances, for different reasons: First, my roommate is new in the choir of the opera, I get cheap tickets and can watch her on stage ;). Second, I’m still developing as a singer and I want to hear and see other singers in their performance. And third (and very important!), for my new job as a teacher in secondary school I need much more knowledge about repertoire, genre and technique.
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So, there were almost only operas to choose for my artist date and I decided to talk about King Arthur, a semi-opera. A semi-opera is a special form of an English baroque opera: It combines acting, singing and dancing. The main characters are actors and don’t sing. The singing roles are supernatural characters like spirits, sirens and nymphs who connect with the ‘real’ characters in different ways for different reasons.
The plot of this King Arthur story is rather simple: King Arthur of England has a bride, princess Emeline of Cornwall who is blind. Arthurs friend, the Saxon King Oswald is also in love with Emeline and he abducts her. Of course, Arthur wants her back and over this jealousness a war breaks out. After about for Acts of battles the Britons defeat the Saxons.
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The stage design in the Gärtnerplatztheater (second opera house in Munich) was very puristic (for opera!): just one large sloping stage area, upstage much higher than downstage. The orchestra pit was also included (in the second half filled with little balls, I don’t know why) – the orchestra played in the rehearsal room and was amplified and transferred into the audience. The costumes were also plain – black pants and strap dresses, partly inspired by a renaissance/baroque style with long, wide skirts and ruffs.
About my observations, impressions, feelings…:
I loved the music, but I didn’t expect anything else. I am a big fan of renaissance and baroque music – these are my favorite musical eras. There were also three very good soloist singers: I liked their timbres and admired their singing techniques.
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I was also impressed by the choir and orchestra: they had an amazing, warm, rich and homogeneous sound. My roommate told me that it was very difficult on stage because they saw the conductor just on a monitor – he was in the rehearsal room conducting the orchestra. During the rehearsals it must have been a big challenge to achieve synchrony between the orchestra and the singers on stage.
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When I visited the performance, I didn’t know exactly what semi-opera meant. I already knew that the dancers would be very present, but I was surprised by the high percentage of spoken word. I am usually not a fan of theatre/drama (I don’t know exactly why, I already saw plays I liked, but unfortunately in most productions I am bored…), but here I found the almost equal weight of play, music and dance very interesting. I liked especially the male actors, the one female actress (princess Emeline) seemed a little bit too exaggerating to me.
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Of course, I focused also on the dancers. I found it very interesting also to observe myself. I think my awareness changed since I started to take dance technique lessons. I focus more on dance aspects like posture, body tension, breath (also important for singing, but in another way) and expression in the movement. In many scenes choir and dancers were staged together or even mixed, performing the same or similar steps, gestures and choreographies. I think for uneducated eyes it was difficult to distinguish between dancers and non-dancers. But I realized that I observed very carefully, attached importance to small things like stretching of the feet, how turned out their legs were and if and how breath and movement were connected.
There were three scenes I especially remembered:
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In the first Act there is a music piece (symphony followed by tenor and chorus) which describes the first battle between Britons and Saxons. For some reason the director decided to use a haka, the ceremonial dance in the Maori culture in this scene. Dancers and chorus performed some kind of haka – I don’t know if it was an original choreography (probably not), but it was clear to identify as a haka. I was a little bit upset for two reasons: First, why did he use a dance from New Zealand for an Anglo-Saxon battle when this reference doesn’t recur at another place in the piece? Second, the haka is so much more than just a ‘battle preparation’ or deterrence of enemies. There are different varieties of the dance, performed by men and women, used for different social occasions like welcoming guests, celebrations and funerals. Using a haka for a war battle seemed somehow flat and weak to me. Although I must admit that it has a very impressive effect. I can imagine that people are moved by this, I felt that too.
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Shortly after this war scene there is a scene where princess Emeline quoted John Lennon’s song Imagine. She said it in German, but in the background the words were repeated in English, so the quote becomes even more clear. The director explains in the program booklet: ‘[…]in ‘my’ King Arthur, Merlin (note: in this opera just an adviser, not a wizard) appears as an Utopian, Arthur’s only friend, who tries to convince the people to not give up the dream of a life in peace, like John Lennon in his song.’ I experienced this small, added scene as very powerful and touching – it kept stuck in my head for a long time.
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In the third Act there is the most known aria from the opera: ‘What power art thou’, sung by the Cold Genius, the spirit of winter. The music reminds a lot of Vivaldi’s Winter; both pieces picture the frost and the cold by a musical ‘shake’: short, dry minor chords with trills on the highest note. In the opera it is a bass aria and in this production the bass soloist sat center stage and everybody else lay around him. On some counts – I couldn’t recognize the pattern – they suddenly changed their positions, like a twitching. It reminded me a lot of Christa’s ‘photos’ in St. Petersburg with the focus, level, … changes. So, I somehow expected more, but in the scene, they stayed on the floor :). But it was still very impressive! Especially because it wasn’t always on the same counts. I loved the scene, maybe also because I love this aria!
The Bacchae - Let us dance
Dance
Director and choreographer: Wim Vandekeybus
Residenztheater /Cuvilliés Theater
For more than 30 years, Wim Vandekeybus has been choreographing and staging pieces around the world and is considered one of Europe's most adventurous performance makers. His works breathe and grow through their interdisciplinary language. Dancers catapult through the space, fireworks of text explode in European and North African tongues and poetic, existential images escape from the film screen. His bodily/kinesthetic drive is realized through the expressive range and subtlety of his dances as well as through the physical power of his video/film work; his musicality is apparent through the careful and challenging choice of music in each of his pieces and for the intrinsic phrasing and musicality of the movement; his spatial strengths are expressed in the architecture of choreography and film and his linguistic care shimmers in the sometimes poetic, sometimes raw and wild texts and for the beautiful titles to his work (What the Body Does Not Remember; Of Wishing and Wanting; Inasmuch as Life is Borrowed, for a few examples).
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His most recent piece I saw last week: The Bacchae - Let us dance (Die Bakchen - lasst uns tanzen) based on Euripides, in a collaboration between his company Ultima Vez and the Residenz Theater (State theater of Bavaria).
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Dionysos was the god in Greek mythology who negated borders; the god and redeemer of people - especially of woman - excluded from power and politics. He freed them from social constraints and from tyrants through his cult of madness, wildness, sexual ecstasy.
Stage-set – white, geometrical platforms glowing in the black space. A woman lays upstage, motionless. A young man silently walks over to her, kneels before her and then covers her body with his. Stillness..…..is broken by a slight movement from high up on the back wall. Slowly a figure descends, hanging, climbing downwards (from Mt. Olympus?), weightless, wordless. He touches down on padded feet, climbs over mother and son, staying close to the ground. Lines appear, trails, signposts, barely discernable. The son rises, comes close to the edge of the stage, and begins his revengeful diatribe against Pentheus, the Theban king of order and reason: the king who won’t acknowledge him, Dionysos, as the son of Zeus.
Vandekeybus’ version replaces the poetic text of Euripides with that of a Flemish author who has simplifies and flattens it. It becomes functional and withers. But sound, images and dance flourish. The black and white world of Pentheus disappears. The stage is a canvas. The painter climbs, slithers, runs, jumps and seems to fly, leaving black lines and splotches. Suddenly, on the 10-meter high wall a story emerges – a female figure and a Satyr in the act of love. The story bursts out of the wall; the bodies of the actors and dancers are painted – black and white becomes grey. An orgy of spinning, grunting, pulling, catching, falling, wallowing, whirling unfolds. The intoxicated women in Euripides – the Bacchae – who destroy the order of the state, are genderless in Vandekeybus.
The motionless mother later becomes the musician who wanders the stage, momentarily calming chaos with her lyre-like instruments. But she also drives the archaic ecstasy with pumping beats of the electro soundscape. Ultimately, as intoxication subsides, power disintegrates and suffering returns. Bodies are painted over with blue and yellow, with red. Death and destruction reign.
My analytical, critical, artistic mind:
The choice of Dionysus - a young man – was perfect – balancing on the cusp between childhood and adulthood. A motherless child. The arrogance of youth! The infinity of youth!
The chaos was too chaotic and too long…structure was missing. A risk.
The wildness in general was too proscribed by the stage space; it was too small for the conflict and tension...
But – (the performance was the baroque theater) – conflict….. power and politics crash with vehement and crazed barbarians….
The text wasn’t sensual so it felt like a stranger in the piece.
Music: an oasis of tranquility
Structure in the chaos
The stage-set: abstract but not. A canvas.
Imagery –
Disturbing
Fascinating
Changing
Magic
Live painting: oh my god.
The painter was a dancer, an actor, a vision, a devil, a god…….
The actors were dancers. Risk
The dancers were actors. Risk
Who was who?
Instinct
Fiskträsk
Connecting to the space
I'm an intruder here. I feel that this space isn't for me, but I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. I hear almost nothing, but if I listen, I hear a lot. The sound of the trees – wind caressing the leaves, needles scratching the bark, trunks swaying in the wind with soft creaks; the sound of the water – small fish breaking the surface with a gentle blop, water rippling against the rocks; the sound of the birds and insects – the complex song of the blackbirds, the wonderful yell of the crows, the cute chirps of the tits, the irritating buzz of the mosquitos. This all comes to me as an orchestrated masterpiece: there are solo and tutti parts, piano and forte, and the sounds are panned widely in the surroundings. In fact, this is the best surround system.
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It's the darkest moment of the night, which isn't dark at all, since it's almost midsummer. I can see the biggest insects on the surface of the water. Dragonflies are dancing their mating dance. The sky is light blue, the forest is dark behind me. I don't want to look there, I prefer the view of the lake. The water is black near the shore, but it lightens towards the horizon. Three bats start to hunt – they come one after another from the forest. Their sound is something I've never heard before, a soft, fast flapping. They move effortlessly, maybe ten centimeters above the water, catching the water striders. It's the first time I see a bat.
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My skin feels a bit raw and sore. I feel the rays of the sun on my cheeks and forehead, I think they woke me up. The memory of the night's calm atmosphere lingers on me. It was a perfect night to sleep outside – not cold, but just enough to have a sleeping bag in the hammock. It's 6 am and the sun is already quite high up in the sky. It's warm, almost hot, but I don't feel like letting go of the sleeping bag yet. I don't feel like letting go of the sleep. The night was absolutely silent, not a whisper of the wind, but now the trees and birds are awake. It's a perfect soundtrack.
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The water feels cold against my chest. The rock I'm standing on is slippery, I have to be careful not to fall. Small fish are swimming around me, I'm trying to be as still as I can not to scare them. Chest is always the hardest part. I love to go in to the water slowly, get used to the temperature one body part at a time. When my feet finally let go of the rock, the feeling is heavenly. My shoulders glide in to the water, and I feel the sting of the coldness. I feel weightless. I take a few strokes and then the familiar thought comes, like it always does: how big is the biggest fish in this lake, and what if it's right under me? I shake the thought off and concentrate on the feeling of the water. It's not cold, but not warm either. It's soft and soothing. I dive into the lake, and all the sounds of the world disappear. I touch my hair under water, it's like the thinnest seaweed.
Jungle
Connecting to the space
Short Introduction
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Sometimes I feel stuck in the city, also feel exhausted in traffic and also between those high-rise apartments. A month ago, with a quick decision I and my husband decided to move into a new house which is near to a small jungle. So, here we are! Before this writing task, I used to have short walks in the jungle, but I guess this one is going to be my first one to explore the nature with my senses and full of mindfulness.
Feeling the “Nature”
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I started to walk, in a very hot afternoon. My brain is full with list of things that I have to do this week. At the same time, trying to feel what is around me.
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Suddenly, I realized that a big cloud showed itself! I was amazed by this cloud, it was huge and purple, backside of it was also full of clouds with mixed colored: yellow and white. Somehow sky became like a stage, representing this big purple cloud – which I may say, like a big ship… Made me thing about am I aware of the sky when I’m walking on the street during the day?
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Then, another magic moment: Suddenly, a lot of butterflies appeared and I was shocked, where are they coming from? When I looked at my right side I saw this beautiful – tufty purple flowers… I don’t know how to describe the smell of these beauties! And the colors... The harmony of green and purple! Because I was very close to the flowers, all the butterflies were gone in a minute. I stepped back and wait a little bit, then enjoyed watching dance of butterflies. I stayed there for a couple minute with feeling excitement and joy!
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At one point, started again my walking. During my walk, I felt the need to come closer to nature, for instance touching a tree, smelling a flower… I really wanted to be a part of the nature through my senses. Then stopped my walking again, I came closer to a beautiful tree. My hands were on trunk, I closed my eyes, concentrated on my breathing. After 5 deep breaths, imagined that if I were this tree... How are the roots of the tree? (my feet became so heavy!) what about branches? (feeling my arms from my shoulders to the fingers) and so on... I’m not sure if words would be enough to explain my feelings through words, but I would say calmness, freshness, awareness through all my senses and being presence, in this beautiful environment.
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After this mindfulness practice, I became more aware of the environment; what is around me, how it affects my feelings and my thoughts through my senses. I find it quite helpful to learn about myself, also to explore the universe where I live.
Mariefred
Connecting to the space
Our task for this artist date was to visit different places and spaces to observe what we see, what we feel and to use all our senses to try and get a holistic experience from different places.
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My first observation regarding this artist date is that my observations were strongly connected to the social situation I was in at that moment. My experience is strongly connected to my state of mind. In another situation I would probably experience the same places in a completely different way.
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I really started to observe my surroundings for this assignment my last week in Sweden. I’ve been living here for almost a year. At the same time as I was taking in everything around me I was also saying my goodbyes.
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Mariefred is a small town by a big lake, the town is idyllic with its old tree houses and nature is just behind the corner. When I made my way through the town to go to the forest I noticed a dialogue between civilisation and nature. At one moment I was listening to the wind in the trees and the duck’s hanging out in the lake and at the next second one of my student’s shouted hello when he passed by me on his bike. I could see the same dialogue also in what I saw and what I could smell. People and nature living side by side. Both living and breathing the same air just nature going at a slower pace. I think that’s one of the reasons why people calm down in nature. You’re a part of nature, it’s a part of you, you get to take part in the rhythm of nature, slowly flowing forward following its natural course. Even if nature doesn’t talk to you physically I often feel less alone in nature than for example walking by myself in the centre of Stockholm, the capital of Sweden. The streets are filled with people walking determined towards their destinations, not looking anyone in the eye, not making contact in any way. Your senses get blurred as well when you’re at a place filled with people, filled with sound and stimuli. In the forest in Mariefred I can smell the flowers and the trees mixed with the salty water of the lake so distinctly, I can hear every branch that breaks when I walk. In the city square it’s hard to identify any smell, hard to identify what I hear when everything is combined in a sort of chaos.
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Comparing these two completely different spaces can draw parallels to how we lead our lives. This year, especially this spring I’ve felt like I’m trying to juggle so many things at the same time. Trying to keep the balls in the air and catching them at the right time. This chaos makes it hard to live in the moment, to enjoy the moment and see the small things that make life magical.
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Music is amazing in that way. Especially when you actively take part in playing or singing. When taking part in music you must take part fully, listen to yourself and everyone else playing. If you put movement into the music it is even more intense. Your whole body is resonating to the music and you are a part of the music with all your senses. Nature is also a mix of different things, but it’s not a chaos, everything is connected to each other, living in harmony. Just like music and movement are woven together, different instrument, harmonies, rhythms, movements, all playing together in the same direction.
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We need more harmony in our lives, we need to connect, with ourselves and with others. And what better way than through music and movement.
Five places
Connecting to the space
May 30th, 8.30 pm – a peaceful sunset
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At this time in the evening I already had been through a heavy day. With two friends I was on my way to a concert in Austria when we had a car accident. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured, but it was a frightening experience and I was still shaking one hour later. After talking to the police and the paramedics, we got picked up, had the rehearsal and sung the concert. Before leaving back to Munich, I took a short walk alone. I came to a viewpoint from where I could overlook the vast landscape with an incredibly beautiful sunset panorama. This was the first moment after the accident I was just for myself. It was so quiet and peaceful – no streets and nobody else to see and I just heard a few birds. I tried to capture the moment with a photo, but it was not very successful. So, I stood there, watched and breathed and – as pathetic it might sound – I was just grateful to live.
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June 1st, 1.00 pm – a moving pattern
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I was hired to sing at a priestly ordination of two Dominicans in Vienna. After the service, there was a buffet for everybody in the cloister and there were about 200 people. Because of the big run on the buffet, I stood a little bit elevated on a few steps and watched the hungry crowd. After a short time, I recognized something: The Dominican friars, dressed in white, and the ‘normal’ people, well-dressed in all kinds of colors, revealed an interesting color pattern. Also, all of them moved! They all had different pathways; some of them in the queue for the buffet, some of them searching for a place to sit, some of them on their way to get a beer. And so, the color pattern constantly changed. I did not stand there for a long time, but it was very interesting to watch the pattern move and change!
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June 4th, 6.10 am – a changing picture
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Every Monday I must get up at 5.30 am because I have to be at the school at 7. Sometimes, I am also awake at this time on other days and I started to then take a walk in the nearby park. This morning, the weather was beautiful, and I decided to sit on a bench for a moment. It was still very quiet, there were just a few joggers and some people with their dogs. I started to become aware of the scene as a changing picture: the park with the meadow and the trees, the blue sky and the sun was like a painting and the moving elements – birds, joggers, walkers – changed it constantly. Every minute, a new work of art was formed!
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June 10th, 6.15 pm – stormy boredom
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I was just waiting to get on the plane to Izmir to visit Ezgi. Suddenly, the weather changed, and boarding was postponed. Really, it was from one moment to the next: from sun and 30 degrees to a heavy thunderstorm with rain and hail. I am always a little bit nervous before flying – I am not afraid, but I find it somehow exciting. With this nervousness, I had to wait almost two hours because of the storm. It was fascinating to watch the weather change in such a short time and to witness the force of nature. It was also interesting to watch the people waiting with me. There were many families with kids, some couples and a few people travelling alone. They were so different but at the same time so similar to each other. So many different personalities doing the same: waiting. Sure, we did different things – listening to music, watching videos, eating snacks, texting, speaking on the phone, standing, sitting, walking – but we were all in the same situations and our possible actions were limited. I started to categorize the actions in different levels like situation (waiting), position (standing, sitting, walking), activity (listening, watching, eating, texting…) and so on. It was interesting and fun and reminded me a little bit of Laban’s movement analysis!
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June 18th, 10.30 am – climbing beauty
About once a week, I go bouldering, mostly with someone from my family. This time I went with my mom and one of my brothers. I find these moments precious because my family is the most important thing to me, and I love spending time with them. In this sport, it is important to take enough breaks and then you sit there watching others and giving them advice. Physical strength is important, but also, you have to analyze the routes and think about your technique to finish them. Especially when I am watching the more experienced climbers, I often start to see them as dancers or at least compare them to dancers. Since I began dancing and creative movement myself, my awareness for my own and for other people’s body and movement became better and better. I can see the beauty in the climber’s movements – how they stretch their feet, use their muscles, flex their knees, turn their legs, reach out with their hands for the next boulder – it is like a little dance on the wall!
Summary
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This task was very important to me. Since I started my teacher training in secondary school, I am constantly busy with work. I had realized that something had changed – I was more hectic, I was always worried that I would forget something, for any reason, I spent more time using my cell phone and so I could not use my spare time as restfully as I should. It was somehow refreshing to have to spend more conscious moments just for myself – calmly and relaxed – and, to write about it. It helped me to sort my thoughts and it gave me more energy for my everyday life.