MEDEA - open studio on tour

andrea & christina.

after a hard nights driving through germany and france we are hoping for the very famous french food. sorry, at this point we have to make it official: french food in some beside-the street restaurants taste like washing powder…(nevertheless friendly garcons)
our travelling-time was calculated really short-without any longer rests or too many pissingstops, but (clever as we are) we calculated some unknown maybes -like an explosion of a wheel – and it was good to do so – couse exactly this happend. Wurz would be jealous on the fastness of our mechanic-crew. With strongly straind nerves we exactly catched the last place at the ferry.
Thanks to the coordinator, and big apprecination to our little princess mari lillian for beeing that smooth..

 

AstridTríAprile: on parting a sense of drifting occurs: I’m gliding through life, it somehow transports me to Ireland. I had stumbled over a basic Irish Gaeilic course on CDRom in a bookstore and found myself delighted in repeating these words and phrases. Only shortly after Andrea asked me to join the Medea trip to Ireland, without even knowing about my interest in the country and the language. Then I started doing some research, out of momentary boredom rather than actually searching for something, and had found the story about Queen Medb and how she conferred with Poets and Magicians. This is what I am going to do, I need to conferr with Poets&Magicians

Passing through France, listening to the incredible sad music of Anthony, all of France turns into the words: “Je ne sais pas ou est tu. Moi je suis ici. Se ci sei tu, dici: croah” - words I had said in a previous work of mine, crying like a crow to mouth things I wasn’t allowed to say out loud… Not knowing then that the sound I would wake up to every morning in Ireland would be the crying of innumerable crows, constantly flapping their wings above my head, delicate crow song.

12.September
andrea & christina: unfortunately we forgot to take some water with us -we can tell you it would be cheaper in mongolia.beside this the night was really short after a few fata morganas we lay our eyes on ireland ( Rosslare) and after arrival our asses in the sand. AstridTríAprile: It was a strange experience on the ferry… I thought I’d have had illusions about the viaggio to ireland and the sea and prepared myself to temporarily become a realistic person who’d just not give herself over to dreams and expectations, in order to not having to suffer from any possible disappointment… but then the wind got in my hair and moved my silken scarf and the ship was moving directly into the clouds which in the morning opend up to the sight of the Isle… and I thought about how I had split myself in two, to arrive on this place, which then becomes the third, because its neither my expectations, nor my improvised non-expectations, but unfolds itself in front of my eyes as what it is, and now Ireland somehow wraps itself around me, its weathers take me in their arms and hold me. During life we are constantly asked „how do you like it?” “what do you think?” “isn’t this good/bad?” and the answer serves mostly to fulfil this persons expectations of what you will say. The ways we present ourselves to the world… Disagreement with the preset of such questions is something that wants to stand up for itself, but the expectation grows only stronger with arguing about and discussion feeds the ego. Every time I am asked, I split my self into tinier and tinier pieces to meet the narrowness of the spectrum these questions and expectations hold. I’d prefer staying quiet. Not to be unsociable. Just to stay whole. Thoughts and emotions then appear as the hidden.
You will find some entries on poetic secrecy on the under the title of “poetry&secrecy”. There I will also try and explain the audio-work I’m doing here in Ireland and (as soon as I can) inform you about its ongoing. This is not an easy thing to do, since often it’s only afterwards that I know what’s relevant to work and what’s not. And we work without electricity and internet almost all of the time, so I scribble some notes and wait for next opportunity to get things done. I think it’s going to be worthwhile for you, gentle readers, to recheck also past read entries, since we’ll do our best to update them whenever we can and refill missing parts with our memories & pictures…Going to Ireland I collect all the bits and pieces of my self, past and future selves, stuff them in a suitcase and ship them into the unknown to let them fall into place there.

The places we go don’t care about our expectations of them.

I kept my splitted emotions a secret (as can be expected by a person like me), but I think here it suits well the themes my work as an artist is about. I will be writing in this blog in my secret language as well, sending out secret messages which I cannot possibly state in any other language, since the words of any language I know and am capable of using have become heavy and loaded with a history I can’t bear to put into poetry, but it can be decipherd. (That’s, by the way, one reason for me to learn the Irish Gaeilic - its complitely void of any conversation I ever had in my live, its spelling’s pure mystery and I can also take advantage of the fact that its so rarely ever spoken to use it as a means of poetry&secrecy.)

My first secret message:

Jobordibi, subu dibi quebestaba nabavebe, laba nobottebe, sdrabaiabataba peber teberraba, sebentebendobo quebel mobovibimebentobo ebe ibil mobovibimebentobo debel mobotoborebe, mibi ribicobordabavobo dibi quebestaba voboltebe, quabandobo cibi sibiabamobo abaddobormebentabatibi schibiebenaba aba schibiebenaba, cobosibi vibicibinibi… ebe aballoboraba quebestobo grabandebe mobotoborebe dibivebentabavaba tebe, ebe mibi tebenebevaba sibicuburaba, pobortabandobomibi a des lointanes ensorceles… Cibi sobono dubuebe libivebellibi dibi rebeabaltábá: ibin ubunaba cibi sebeibi abandabatobo cobon mebe, nebel abaltrobo ibinvecebe nobo. ibio cibi stobo inbetween, ebe nobon mibi abascoboltaba nebessubunobo, nébé nebel ubunaba, nébé nebel abaltraba. Laba tubuaba Abastribibebellaba

Further secret messages to come under the title of “secret messages”.

After our arrival in Ireland we immediately went looking for a quiet place on the shore.I remember the last time I have been seeing the sea: the mere sight of it meant delight, each wave causing a tingle inside my head that kept repeating the word “inexhaustible, inexhaustible, inexhaustible…”, and I had felt an enchantment almost at the brink of madness. The Irish Sea touched me in a way very close to that, but totally different at the same time. I felt the same enchantment, but without thinking it as something extraordinary. It felt like home. And even this feeling of “home” is so strange, so unknown (yet something inside of me knows exactly what it is, and carries it through my life).
I took my audio-bag and went to make some recordings of the sea, my daughter running after me and taking my hand. I look at the pictures the others took of me walking at the beach and I can’t identify with the woman on these photographs at all. Am I a woman wearing jeans and a jacket? I can’t remember putting them on, I can’t even remember having bought these clothes. Maybe this outward form of mine made itself a shell, to create a hiding place for my self.
Coming back to our meeting point after recording the sea we encountered this old man having sat down there beside us. His presence radiated pure beauty and overwhelming friendliness. He made several attempts to talk to Marililli, always smiling, visibly enjoying her presence as well. I wanted to talk to him, but was too shy. Marililli wanted to talk to him, but was too shy. Seeing this man and sitting down near him I felt a confidence I hardly ever feel in life. This man somehow means that life is basically good. So gentle.
Parts of me steal themselves away to live there by the sea, going for a walk each day, looking out at the Irish Sea. My daughter goes playing with old Mr. … in the afternoon and I prepare a thermos jug of tea and some sandwiches for them to share and life is good.
We head on, to find ourselves a place to stay the night. On the road we see the ruins of a castle, go to have a look and end up staying the night. Miserable princes in the wind and the rain.

13. September:

andrea:The ruins guarantee a very special kind of comfort at 7p.m after a wet and windy wake up.
We feel like grottenolms – forgotten creatures of past times - pale and transparent sourrounded by fog. Neither the first coffee nor the second could bring back cosiness so we choose to drink some wodka and set the dragon free.
christina:uiuiui…a very special place. the night was clear and the stars amazing. we wanted to make something creative, but out of the cold point of view, we let the art art be. we raise our third flag…