Walking the Gray Area

we suffered a big earthquake last friday night in chile. its a very very gray-black area for a lot chileans.

almost everyone here suffered in some way. damage houses, fear, no light, no water, no communication, their loved ones lost.

soon i will be  in touch, thankfully all my friends and family are fine.

Hi andrea: this is a fragment of the final piece. Today I will put it in a box to send it. i dont think the proyect it’s over…let’s see what happend now…maybe the gray area turns to something more colorful!

“A Perfect Fit? >or<  Greener Grass On The Other Side?”

final pieces, but not final pictures….

Hi Andrea, I’m still looking for the right fit. Knot or unknot?…and taking a look to our conversation, from the begining….

papier maché, pigment

still trying out some ideas….

I actually like a surprising side-line idea of the huge shadow gray area of all those people following us on the blog. Those little clusters that with time started growing and becoming bigger – kind of like grapes or moss… but I’m afraid I can’t get the technique to bring forth the results I would like.

back to work.

from paper to bench…

Sounds like a very interesting vacation but soothing for the nerves. You are right about getting to work, and don’t worry – you should do what it pulls you to. I have been losing myself between the layers so-to-speak, trying to block out information over-flow of the blogging activity of all the artists and at the same time use it to widen perspective. It is so interesting to read all these different angles and directions of thoughts that people are giving on the theme. But given that time is really running far too fast now, I too think it important that we each concentrate on starting our own works.

Hi Andrea

I think our time is running now. It’s time to materialize our thoughts into metal (to say it in same way). I don’t want to start to close our conversation, maybe still there’s a lot to say.

I spend the last days of 2009 , and the first of 2010 walking. We walked during 6 days. We climb a mountain and we were in a natural hot springs. We didn’t find other people during this days. It is really amazing to be in a place like that, where you really can make a contrast between what we called civilization and nature. Where you can see the water that feed the cities, and how it was the land before the first migrations started. Point zero.

In this area you can see a lot of  trails that have been made by muleteers (arrieros), because they move their animals in summer (generally cows) from the lower ground to upper sides, looking for good grass for their animals. They usually trespass the “imaginary” boundaries between Chile and Argentina. There’s no limits for them, even the mountains or big canyons. They trace their path putting images of saints in the tress. They carve the trees and put this image with candles. You also find empty bottles of liquor in this places. They sign the tress with their names and dates.

They are migrating every year to the same place. Sometimes they are alone for several months. It’s inherent to them to sign the road and their pass. They are living a trace, a basic one, but a trace.

…//comunity//enjoy little things//talk more//go to the countryside//less TV//call our friends//teach with patience//peace// buy less//walk//read more//more culture//celebrate life// greener life//swapping//use the bike//dream// recycle//do things with your hands//share with elders//happiness//laugh//…

Hi Andrea

Here is summertime. It’s quite hot and every day we see fire around us, and of course, tons of smoke ( The first picture was taken some days ago in our countryside place) I found this snakeskin in the countryside this last week end.

It is not what we have been talking about this last months?

Layers and layers. Our trace. Leave our footprint while we are moving_migrating. Patterns, clothes….I was talking about charcoal some posts ago, and both, the skin and the charcoal are traces of something that happend violently. I mention it as a parallelism between our own human experiences_ feelings_travels_creation.

I think this encounter it’s our Christmas gift.

(I will be back on January 5th. I’ll go  to Valdivia, and then we will go to climb the Longaví volcano. Longaví means “snake’s head” in Mapuche language, so….see you in January!!!)

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic-video/550283/82770/Learn-how-and-why-snakes-shed-their-skin

Hi Andrea

You are right doing a relation between the Quipus and the carpets! Its very interesting to find some similitude between different cultures, and historic periods. Knots are the base of many textiles, and also the base of a lot of mountain and sailing apparel.

How can we communicate now trough them? Using thread to repair our clothes by ourselves? knotting our hair with rastas? Knotting handkerchief often to remember? (I know the expression, but I can’t find a  phrase in Spanish to say it).

Knots to remember.

Knots to tell, to count, to fix, to join….

Knots to unknot?

*I found this objects ( 1_3) on the street some days ago. Beautiful knots.

I see you are a lover of sewing too (or maybe just do it out of necessity…)! It’s exactly these funny overlapped sewing patterns that I also think of in regards to cultural behavior patterns or movements in life. In Germany they are the ‘famous’ BURDA sewing patterns from the do-it-yourself fashion magazine with the same name. You go crazy trying to make sense and unravel them! All these years I have been holding on to a piece of one, and it’s been stuck to my studio wall for ages and inspiring different thoughts. I also love those little drawings demonstrating the different pattern pieces on the back.

I also really love the idea of the Quipus, very exciting. And the first thing that popped into my mind in connection with the talking knots was how carpets are knotted too and usually made of wool, only that their sometimes symbolic storytelling was in the images that were created on the surface. We could regard the experiences in our life or many of the memories as knots marking a continuous string.  There’s also the saying about making a knot in your handkerchief meaning that you want to remember something. Do you have that in Spanish too? Too bad the Quipus system is still a mystery — it would be so interesting to maybe be able to apply it to something…

Hi Andrea

If we want to symbolized the idea of overlapping our daily routines and paths, or  even our thoughts, we may invent a new way of drawing, maps or patterns.

Paper patterns hide different shapes, it’s a language. Decode layer by layer. (again !).

And now I will jump into the Inkas. (Leonor and Miguel are talking about them).

I visited a exhibition called “ Chile under the Inka empire” .There I saw Quipus (sometimes called talking knots).

The Incas had never acquired the art of writing, but they developed  a system of knotted cords to store massive amounts of information important to their culture and civilization. The Quipus were made of Alpaca or Llama wool, dyed in various colors, the significance of which was known to the magistrates. The cords were knotted in such a way to represent the decimal system and were fastened at close intervals along the principal strand of the quipus.

It’s still a mystery how to use the quipu.

Hi Carolina,

While you’ve being breaking down the layers or removing them to get to the core I’ve been playing with the idea of overlap. How would it look if our lifestyles were theoretically overlapped as layers, or our paths that we take in everyday life — what kind of pattern would it create?

“What makes Argia different from other cities is that it has earth instead of air. The streets are completely filled with dirt, clay packs the rooms to the ceiling…”

I wanted to undress my past, take off the clothes of my memories, layer by layer, as if it were skin, painfully. Developing images, discovering hidden feelings, destroying to build.

Hi Andrea:

I took some pictures in Valdivia, I was there (again!) to participate in a barter fair. It was in the old train station, that now it’s rusty and abandoned.

Abandoned

Spanish tower//A tree//Old train//Telephone office

Looking for traces, time, signs of life, intuition.

Traces of migrations, nature, travels, communication.

People.

Hi Andrea. There are too many old buildings in Idar_Oberstein? I have that feeling.-

I’m always watching the city where I live (now is Valparaiso), I’m very interested in knowing what it’s happening with the old buildings and the new ones. Here is very common to see how the old buildings are disappearing because a fire, earthquakes or just because they have been abandoned for many years. The law it isn’t very strong to protect them, and of course, it’s a best business to build from zero, so many, many buildings are disappearing. It’s quite sad. It’s very different of what I have seen in Europe, that seems to be the opposite.

As architect, is easier to go inside these buildings…at least to be a witness.

I took this picture some days ago. This building withstood one of the majors earthquakes of Valparaiso (1906), it’s a solid one!, and now all the parts have been taking away to be sell as wood, parquet, windows and doors.

I have the impression that the building itself it’s like a big person, and somebody it’s taking off his clothes, layer by layer. It’s a complete nudity.

Paint//Plaster as a Copihue relief (National flower of Chile) //Modern MDF panel //Wood //Adobe

Hi Carolina, it’s good that you are starting to get closer to what you want to do. I’m working here on stones in thoughts of what I could do with them in the future, what kind of theme(s) would fit etc. And while that is going on my emotional and mental “body” is dealing with the migration theme while my physical body is trying to fit into the time plan! Since I have had thoughts about the emotional-cultural aspect of migrants for new work even before WGA came on my path I am quite positive that that is the direction my work for this show will take me. Especially since that is what I feel most strongly about, less about actual borders. My way of working usually ends up being a playing with materials and shapes and details that remind me of the exact feeling to translate. That is actually what interests me a lot – different layers of possible aspects that in the end are connected or comparable even though they may even be quite different. For example these two pictures taken in the old chain factory her in Idar-Oberstein behind the artist-in-residence apartment:

Seeing the beautiful old radiators made me think of the feeling I have for my old home country Germany – lovely (to remember) but not functional (in my new life) or connected to the time now anymore.

Hi Andrea

I’m starting to join some elements. Charcoal, hand made paper (the one you saw), and enameling surfaces…..All of them came from our conversations. I have in mind words as “limits _ borders _ contrasts”.

I don’t know if you notice that for me it’s easier to use images to explain my thoughts, so, I will add a picture! The upper part is a piece I did when I was living in Barcelona, it was about “bird houses”, and was linked with the abandon places in that city. The other picture is a construction where I participated in the years as architecture student.

The limit here is the scale. In both works the topic is “to give a place to stay”.

I would like to find a way to connect our works.

I have two sets of materials. Maybe I can send you one, and I work with the other one…..and you can do the same….well, it’s an idea…….I know you are quite busy now…so I will wait for your answer.

Totally stressy… So sorry, Carolina, but this back and forth every weekend is and will stay really time-consuming. I feel I do not have enough hours to keep up on everything. Even downloading photos, gettin them ready for posting, for the blog is more than I can do. Most of my hours each day here, even on the weekend to catch up for lost time  (and dead tired coming back to my temporary ‘home’) are at the school and grinding mills. The stone process is quite slow. Also have to keep up with my professional contact work even on the side lines (and internet connection here at the apartment is SO slow). No time for drawing just for fun or feeling like taking a walk in the fall forest. But the wheels are so addictive, and the time at them can be hell for your hands and back, but the humming sound creates a meditative bubble that just envelopes my mind and is totally calming. So with this in my life right now you will probably not hear that often from me from now through November.

There are things here around the behavior of people that every now and then just make me so happy I am not living on this side of the border any more! Actually, a big gift to be able to spend time here like this to really ‘get that message’! It still will never take away the Gray Area of being immigrant but will hopefully soften the edges somewhat.

Your studio view towards the mountains is lovely, and the summer light soothing. Must be very productive!

Enjoyment and adventures in the gray area to you,

Andrea

Hi Andrea….How do you feel travelling from one reality to onother? How do you perceive  the distances/ the light/ the language/the architecture/ the people?…(I think that will be in the gray area pieces!)

Now, the pictures…_1_ in my studio (also home) windows I have attached pictures taken from my studio (also home) in Barcelona_2_actual view from my window _3_drawing of nº II _4_house in the countryside where we are planning to move soon, and where I go three times a week. I can say that at the moment I feel overlaped by images of different places. I know where I am, but I’m also in other places at the same time. Again in the no-place,  parenthesis.

Hi Andrea….these two palettes were in my desk for years, and I found them today, and what a nice coincidence the names….how they choose them? Maybe now we can paint ourselves as “online gray”, or “network gray”.

likes//dislikes///I like the idea to connect things. I like mountains. I like gray. I dont like flat cities. I like Amsterdam. I like to be a little bit german. I am chilean but I don’t identify with it sometimes. I am here but sometimes I would like to came back to Barcelona. I’am architect but I prefer to be jeweler. I like the contrast between opposites.

Hi Carolina, nice paper! Considering the many drab or ugly buildings that exist, just think of  all the beautiful paper that could have been if they hadn’t been build but their plans mashed to pulp. I love the burnt tree from which you took charcoal to make drawings.

I just returned yesterday evening from a back and forth to Amsterdam for a couple days. That was interesting! As the Human Magnet I picked up very clearly on my own feelings. It was a terrific ‘high’ coming back to that city. I felt lighter, happier, happy to be able to live there, and being a part of it. Even though I like mountains very much (I think), and Idar-Oberstein is in a tight vally between smaller mountains, I just felt I was able to breath deeper in the flat wide landscape that Amsterdam is in. Also the mind frame and way of people. This made me realize just how much I have moved away from my German roots to my “foster roots”.

After reading Susanne Klemm’s comment about appreciating her Swiss roots much more now I came to realize that it is just the opposite with me. I have actually never felt patriotic or proud about being German, had never thought about it when I lived there. Too young as a 5 year old when we left it, and not feeling particularly German growing up in Canada except for having German parents, I had to get used to being German when I was 17 and often felt that a part of me was missing because I didn’t have the same stories of TV programs, books, songs, or school lessons the others did. Later when living in Holland I was happy to be European. It felt bigger and wider somehow.

The Gray Area for me is actually a metaphysical space rather than a physical area or color. It’s the in-between areas filled with stuff like unclarity, confusion, insecurity, undecidedness and so forth. Physical gray is for me just a color that can be relaxing to the eyes from too much color, it can be calming, or just nice to wear. It’s everywhere, even as floor color in my apartment because it connects colors well. Maybe that’s it! Maybe a gray area is needed to connect things?

Ciao, Andrea

View over part of Amsterdam harbor from the building of where my job is. W-I-D-E ….. take a deep breath!

Hi Andrea! How are you?

I have been thinking about opposites…black_white//human_nature//creation_demolition//hand_machine…and I have been doing paper! The last two years I was working as architect, so I have a lot of building plans. I took one of them to transfrom it into pulp, and then in paper. I’ts a gray paper…