The hiking path called the Little Bear’s Trail is a 12 km circular walk that touches the real 80 km Bear Trail in Oulanka National park. In Finnish it is called pieni karhunkierrosThe huge park is situated quite near the Russian border in Koillismaa (northeastern land) in the northeast of Finland. It is supposed to be one of the most beautiful national parks in the country, and yes, after seeing a small corner of it I have to admit that it is quite spectacular, especially now when the colours of autumn start to spread on the slopes. It has some beautiful gorges and river valleys with rapids that attract people engaged in white water sports. The small suspension bridges swinging with each step are quite scary for a person unaccustomed to them.
I came here following the suggestion of a friend, who thought this would be the right place for a one week hike. I quickly realized that sleeping in a tent in the forest in the autumn, when the nights are dark and chilly, was not such a good idea, especially since I have no experience of hiking or camping since the 1970’s. So I came here like an elderly tourist, staying at a local inn enjoying my warm bed and some good food, and experiencing the park in daytime only. I was not the only one to do that. This weekend the trail was absolutely packed with families and elderly couples who had estimated that the autumn colours would be at their best right now. Two weeks from now, with the first frost, might me even more beautiful, I guess.
I walked the Little Bear’s Trail twice, counterclockwise on Saturday, as suggested by the Forest Department, and clockwise on Sunday, as suggested by the locals. Of course the latter knew what they were talking about. And Sunday morning was quiet, too. I had the wilderness park (what a contradiction in terms!) almost for myself. Performing landscape on a popular trail in a national park is a weird idea, of course. Actually I brought my video camera and my scarf (my costume) with me more in order to reassure myself that I might do something useful, too, and not only enjoy myself by watching the arriving “ruska”, as the autumn colours are called in the north.
I made some small attempts at performing landscape for video camera on tripod, in my usual manner, sitting with my back to the camera, wearing the dark blue scarf of the year. And I quickly realized this was a vertical landscape, with the riverbed in the gorge, the cliffs on the banks, the tall trees. Everything suggested a vertical composition, so I simply turned my video camera sideways on the tripod. The most beautiful views with the rapids down in the gorge were difficult to record, but I made some small attempts anyway, relying on chance, as always. At least the image by Myllykoski, sitting near the water in the shadow of a cliff while the sun sparkled in the whitewater, should be OK. Sitting by rapids could be an interesting series to create, the sound of the water rushing through the rocks is fascinating and the forceful movement of the water is captivating and dramatic. Of course it is very romantic, too, so some form of antidote is probably needed. Or perhaps my presence is enough of an antidote, after all.
I also made some experiments with a small pebble I picked on Harakka Island earlier and painted a red arrow on, somewhat reminiscent of the double happiness sign I painted on a roof tile in Farrera in 1999, which resulted in the video work Double Happiness in Water (2001). This pebble with the arrow I placed in the corner of the image, pointing towards something worth focusing on. I soon realized that the only interesting images were again the vertical ones were the arrow points upward at the view. Much depends on the light, which I never know how to manipulate, I simply take it as given, and occasionally it is marvelous, though most often not.
The images were more of a side effect of this trip, which after all was more about clearing my mind than filling my hard disk with images. Some ideas were emerging, however, grace to the refreshing environment, like experimenting with vertical composition, searching for rapids and playing with the arrow – and perhaps visiting more national parks…
All posts by Annette Arlander
Watching the Birches Suffer in August
After a long period of warm, dry weather the birches on the cliffs on Harakka Island, (which I visit once a month during this year of the horse 2014 as a remake of my weekly visits during the year of the horse in 2002) have been completely yellow, like in autumn, since there is very little soil on the cliffs and no water without rain. But today, after the rainfall last night I expected them to look invigorated. Because of the brisk wind, however, most of the dry leaves had fallen, so the landscape looked even more autumnal, despite some fresh greenery here and there.
Since my last visit in July I have participated in another conference, the world Congress of the IFTR (International Federation for Theatre Research) at Warwick University in the UK, with the theme Theatre and Stratification. The reason I visit that conference almost every year, despite my very limited interest in theatre, is the active and supportive Performance as Research Working Group, which I have been a member of from the start. Baz Kershaw and Jacqueline Martin started the group (the first official meeting took place in Helsinki in 2006), which I now co-convene together with Jonathan Heron and Emma Meehan. We had a great meeting again this year, or several meetings, during the conference.
My paper for the working group was called “Performing with Plants – Challenges to Traditional Hierarchies?” and did not deal with this remake of the Year of the Horse at all. Rather, I focused on my work from last year, the year of the snake, which was all about swinging. And the assemblage formed by a plank and some rope attached to a tree called a swing, is of course a good example of how we normally take for granted the plants that support our activities. In a workshop organised together with Stefanie Bauerochse and Juan Manuel Aldape Munoz we invited people to swing from an old oak (me), to climb that oak and read some lines of Shakespeare (Stefanie) and walk into the art centre and watch a small performance with one of the volunteers (Juan). The book of abstracts, including these ones, can be found online here.
The huge oak I attached the swing to in Warwick (see video clip) resembled the tall redwood tree the swing was attached to at the PSi conference on Stanford University campus last year 2013 (see video clip). It was very different from the birch I tied the swing to at the opening of the Water Images exhibition here on this island this spring, and at the full moon party again last Saturday, 9 August. Or from the ash tree next to gallery Augusta on Suomenlinna during the t0NiGHt performance art event in May and again on 25 July. The mechanism was the same, though. I invited people to swing, video recorded them swinging, and then cut out the change beteeen peple so the movement of the swing continues uninterrupted, although the person swinging changes.
In my experiments here in Finland, which have been performances in the context of contemporary art rather than conference presentations, I have added another layer, by projecting the video back onto the same place and trying to swing together with the image as a performance of sorts. (see a very dark video clip of the beginning of the performance at t0NiGHt). The second experiment here on this island, Swinging in Moonlight, worked a little better, as you can see from this short video clip. An older birch is actually an ideal projection screen, with its white bark.
Att gunga med projektioner
Denna sommar, efter utställningen med Ormens år i Gungan på Muu galleriet i maj, har jag gjort några experiment med samma gunga på Sveaborg och på Stora Räntan. De har byggt på idén att bjuda publiken att gunga, banda in det på video, projicera en editerad version av denna video senare på samma plats och försöka själv gunga i takt med de som gungar på bilden. Tanken att kombinera en projicerad bild av en handling och en live version av samma handling är inte ny, jag har försökt med något liknande tidigare, men att projicera en tidigare inspelad bild på samma ställe har jag inte gjort förut. En beskrivning av Lorie Novaks arbeten i en text av Marianne Hirsch i antologin Interfaces, redigerad av Sidonie Smith och Julia Watson (2002) var en inspiration för dessa experiment. Hon projicerade bilder från sitt familjealbum, sin mors ansikte ifall jag minns rätt, på buskar om natten. Det lät spännande, så jag bestämde mig för att försöka projicera något på vegetation.
Det första experimentet inleddes under performance natten t0NiGHt på Sveaborg natten mellan den 23 och 24 maj. Då hängde jag min gunga i ett träd nära Galleri Augusta och bjöd frivilliga från publiken att gunga strax innan soluppgången. Senare editerade jag en video genom att kombinera all bilder av de gungande och klippa bort bytena dem emellan. Dessutom zoomade jag in bilden lite med hjälp av en effekt, för den ursprungliga bilden var tagen med kameran på ett onödigt långt avstånd från gungan, på grund av elsladdens längd. Denna “deltagande” performance skedde utanför det officiella programmet, men det oaktat tog Antti Ahonen några bra bilder som finns på evenemangets hemsida, här.
Den andra delen, som ägde rum den 25 juli var annonserad på förhand men är illa dokumenterad. I denna egentliga performance hängde jag gungan på samma plats och projicerade den editerade videon på det mörka hustaket, från en liten annan vinkel. Dessutom riggade jag min kamera på stativ för att dokumentera min performance, men av någon anledning spelade den in bara en minut från början, och sedan ingenting. Så vad gjorde jag då under föreställningen? Jag satte mig i gungan och försökte följa med rytmen hos de som gungade i bilden. Till en början bytte jag riktning och kopierade även på andra sätt de gungande, men efter några varv insåg jag, att det var viktigare att hålla rytmen. De mest våghalsiga bland dem som gungade vågade jag hur som helst inte efterapa. Allt som allt gungade jag i en och en halv timme, och det följande programnumret inleddes som överenskommet nere på gården medan jag ännu fortsatte. Efteråt var de några som kommenterade att bilden var fin, absurd och overklig, med en skugga som egentligen inte var en skugga. Jag antar att det blev ett slags palimpsest eller en bild med flera lager, som minnet. Den korta snutten från början, väldigt mörk, finns att se här.
Det andra experimentet inledde jag nästan samtidigt, under vernissagen för sommarutställningen Vattenbilder på Stora Räntan den 29 Maj. Den här gången hade jag möjlighet att välja ett bättre träd, en gammal björk mitt på gården, och jag presenterade projektet som en upplevelse att pröva på. Nu var jag också klokare såtillvida att jag bad de gungande skriva sina namn i en lista så att jag skulle kunna nämna deras namn på videon. Denna video editerade jag enligt samma princip, men nu behövde jag inte zooma in bilden. Ett tillfälle att projicera videon på björken fick jag i samband med månskensfesten den 9 augusti. Programmet finns här, tyvärr endast på finska. Först tänkte jag visa bara projiceringen, som jag kallade “keinutellen kuutamolla” (gungande i månsken), men inspirerades att göra en oannonserad performance med gungan och projiceringen, för kamera. Och den här gången fick jag något på bild också.
Tanken var att låta projektionen rulla från klockan åtta till midnatt, men åttatiden var det ju ännu ljust, så jag hittade på en nödlösning: ett gammalt vitt lakan, som jag använt som bordduk, på byksträcket mellan björkarna tjänstgjorde som filmduk. Det såg ganska fint ut när bilden så småningom började framträda i skymningen. Och gungans rörelse i bilden fungerade bra med den riktiga gungans rörelse i björken intill. Det var svårt att få båda med i samma bild, kamerans bildvinkel är mindre än ögats, ifall man inte använder vidvinkel objektiv. Dessutom varierar ljuskänsligheten på ett helt annat sätt. Ögat kan se både gungan och den skira projektionen, men videokameran kan urskilja bara någondera i taget.
När det väl var mörkt riktade jag, som planerat, projektorn mot den andra björken, vars löv sträckte sig ända ner till marken, men insåg snabbt att det var intressantare att projicera bilden mot samma björk som syntes i bilden. Björkens vita stam var tillräckligt tjock för att man kunde urskilja de gungande, och rörelsen syntes också tydligt i det belysta lövverket. Det såg ganska magiskt ut, åtminstone för blotta ögat, och nu kunde nog videokameran också urskilja något. Tyvärr bandade jag inte in hela videon från början till slut, utan bara ett fragment med lakanet och ett annat fragment med projektionen på björkstammen och med mig i gungan. En kort snutt finns att se här.
På det stora hela taget var jag rätt nöjd med det här senare experimentet och skulle gärna pröva på några fler varianter vid rätt tillfälle och rätt plats. Det där med att projicera en bild tagen på en plats på samma ställe är värt att experimentera vidare med. Gungandet är i och för sig en lämplig handling, för gungans rytm är rätt urskiljbar och kännspak även då projektionen är vag.
Returning to the Rock in July
Revisiting the same rock on Harakka Island in Helsinki, which I used to visit weekly in 2002 and which I now visit once a month as a kind of re-enactment of that previous year of the horse, feels like a relaxed return home after a trip to Shanghai in China. During the conference Performance Studies International 20 at the Shanghai Theatre Academy I actually showed a quickly edited version of the first part of these re-visits together with the original work in a small performance-presentation called “Revisiting the Year of the Horse”. Besides the original video Year of the Horse (12 min) from 2003 I also showed the work Sitting on a Rock (Rock with Text) (6 min.) which I made the following spring at Easter time in the same place. Moreover, I presented a work performed recently in Koivumäki after midsummer Sitting on a Rock in Rain, which I have described in the Finnish version of this blog and which I edited specifically to be presented in Shanghai. The occasion was an event organised by the artistic research working group Porous Studio Avant-Gardening.
Sitting on the same rock again, knowing that the second half of the year is still in front of me, feels both strange and familiar at the same time, like engaging with the remains of some ancient practice that does not really belong to me or my concerns at the moment any more. On the other hand I have not invented any significantly different approaches to performing landscape, not yet. In Shanghai not only the landscape and the environment are different, the temperature, humidity and consistency of the air is perhaps the most striking difference. The whitish fog in the hot and humid monsoon-time city is very different from the cool breeze on this semi-sunny afternoon here by the sea. In general a certain amount of warm humidity feels nice to breathe and soothes your skin. When it is combined with heavy pollution, the effect is not so nice, though. In Shanghai they seem to understand that oxygen must be produced, since they have planted lots of trees everywhere. And for the first time I really sensed how my body automatically started to navigate closer to trees and bushes in order to find more air to breathe.
In fact I did not sit on a rock during my performance in Shanghai, nor did I try to find a rock to sit on in the nearby parks or on campus. Although I carried my video camera with me, and unlike the sessions of the Porous Studio at previous conferences, I did not document anything on video or create any new work. I took a lot of snapshots with my phone, of course, but that was part of my duties as a tourist. Some of the rocks in the famous Yuan Gardens, which I visited already on the first day, would well be worth sitting on, although the classical Chinese garden is packed with people most of the time. While visiting a huge new recreational park in Chanzhou, a nearby city where we were taken for a “retreat” after the conference, I realised that the idea of combining natural and artificial elements and creating mixtures of nature-culture has been part of the Chinese civilisation from very early on. It is only the enormous scale that makes it scary.
For the presentation I tried to write a new version of the text “Sitting on a Rock”, without much success. I am not happy with the version I presented, so I will not reproduce it here, but only the informative text I began my presentation with:
The popularity of various forms of re-makes, reconstructions, re-enactments etc. has been discussed in recent years, for instance in the anthology Perform, Repeat, Record Live Art in History, by Amelia Jones and Adrian Heathfield (2012). And the fascination with all these repetitions (with variations) of classical performance art pieces could certainly be discussed in terms of the avant-garde (one of the themes of the conference) as a historical phenomenon, the radical gestures of which we can only repeat and rehearse with a historical interest for want of any real innovation or critical force in the current situation today. But what about revisiting your own work? Is that not the ultimate evidence of total stagnation, even stultification of what might have remained of a critical impulse?
In the year 2002 I decided to document changes in the landscape by visiting the same place on Harakka Island in Helsinki approximately once a week for an entire year. It was a development of a work called Wind Rail, where I visited the same place once or twice a day for two weeks to show the changes caused by changes in the weather. In that work I had placed myself in two different positions in the image space, first at the side in the foreground, like the marginal shepherd figure in classic landscapes, who is supposed to guide the viewer’s gaze into the landscape, and then further in the image more centrally, as a smaller figure embedded in the landscape. In both cases the human figure dominates the image. This dichotomy I wanted to exaggerate further and thus placed myself in front of the camera first in such a way that my shoulder covered half of the view, literally preventing the viewer from seeing the landscape. And secondly, as you will see soon in part two, I placed myself deeper in the landscape as a tiny figure sitting on a rock. My idea was to create a two-channel installation with part one, the shoulder, on the left, and part two, the figure on the rock to the right. Due to automatic light balance the colour and brightness of the images did not combine well; they change between the first part with the scarf covering half of the image and the second part with the view of the landscape and me sitting on the rock to such an extent, that presenting them next to each other as a two-channel installation was difficult. So the work turned into a single channel video, in two parts, one after the other.
To call the work Year of the Horse was almost a coincidence. While documenting a day and a night on the same rock the following spring, I realized it was the year of the goat. The size of the rock somehow worked with the size of a goat, and I liked the idea of years having names. Only much later did I learn more about the Chinese calendar and its twelve animals, and decided to try to document a full twelve-year cycle. Although I had started it in the middle, in the south, as it were, in the year of the horse, rather than in the year of the rat, in the north, as is traditionally done. I completed the cycle of years in the year of the snake in 2013 (actually January 2014, since the Chinese new year falls on the first new moon after the winter solstice). To accentuate the idea of cyclic return I decided to revisit the same site this year, in 2014, since we are living in the year of the horse again. But this time only once a month, to form a calendar of sorts.
Now, in the year of the horse 2014, I sit once a month on the same rock, with the same scarf, but with a new camera (HD) and new image proportions (16:9 instead of 4:3). The year is obviously not finished yet, so what you see is February, March, April, May and June, only. What you see is the “remake”, revisiting the same site. The small windmill is the only visible difference in the environment. I seem to repeat the original technical problems, too, however, because I still use only automatic camera functions. At least time is speeded up in this monthly version…
Istun kivellä – sateessa
Päivä kivellä Kalvolassa, tai ehkä vuorokausi. Tähän kirjaan muutaman rivin jokaisesta kuvauskerrasta, eli kahden tunnin välein. Teen sen suomeksi, sillä tässä paikassa olen aina puhunut suomea. Olen kuvannut täällä aiemminkin, esimerkiksi työt Sitting on a Birch (2006), Secret Garden 1-2 (2006), Year of the Dog in Kalvola – Calendar (2007) sekä Becoming Juniper – Kalvola (2012). Viimeksi mainittua lukuun ottamatta ne on kaikki kuvattu vuoden ajan viikoittain (kalenteri tosin kuukausittain). Nyt aion kuvata vain päivän, ehkä vuorokauden.
Kello kuudelta (tai hiukan ennen) maanantaina 23 kesäkuuta, heti juhannuksen jälkeen aloitin kuvaamisen, sateessa. Valitsin kuvauspaikaksi ainoat lähistöllä olevat kivet, Koivumäessä syreenitarhan yläpuolella. Asetin kameran korkeimmalle mättäälle ja suuntasin sen niin, että samaan kuvaan osui kaksi sammaloitunutta kiveä, toinen etualalla oikealla, toinen taustalla hiukan vasemmalla. Ja niin voisin siirtyä ensimmäiseltä toisella samassa kuvassa. Päätin aloittaa aikaisin, sillä mikäli haluaisin voisin lopettaa päivän illalla, sen sijaan että jatkaisin vuorokauden ympäri, vaikka tähän aikaan vuodesta yö onkin lyhyt ja valoisa, joten jotakin varmasti näkyisi kuvassa myös puolenyön jälkeen. Mutta halusin siis varata itselleni mahdollisuuden kuvata vain päivän, joten oli parasta aloittaa aikaisin. Ainoa haittapuoli varhaisessa aloituksessa oli sade. Tihkusateen sijaan nyt satoi suuria märkiä pisaroita, ei kaatamalla, mutta riittävän tiheään tahtiin, jotta kivellä istuessakin kastuisi kunnolla. Onneksi sisällä on lämmintä, vaatteet kuivuvat nopeasti.
Kello kahdeksalta sade jatkuu. Unohdin taas ottaa stillkuvan puhelinkamerallani. Ensimmäisen kerran jälkeen palasin takaisin ottamaan kuvan, sillä aloituspiste on tärkeä dokumentoida. Stillkuvan rajaus on tietysti erilainen kuin videokameran, mutta silti. Nyt, toisella kerralla, istuin lyhyemmän aikaa, mutta rauhallisemmin. Kuvasin “tyhjää” maisemaa tavallista pidempään, sillä kuulin junan lähestyvän ja tallensin sen ohiajon kokonaisuudessaan, jottei ääni katkeaisi kesken. Tällä kertaa ei autoja ajanut ohi, vaan joku visertävä lintu jatkoi sinnikkäästi lauluaan koko kuvan ajan.
Kello kymmeneltä sade taukosi. Tuuli ravisteli puista pisaroita niskaani, samoin syreeninoksista portaiden yläpuolella, mutta muuten ilma oli paljon kuivempi. Samat linnut visersivät edelleen sinnikkäästi, autoja ajoi ohi tasaisin väliajoin, ja muutenkin kolmas istunto muistutti edellisiä. Vaikka sää olisi pilvinen ja kostea se ei haittaa, ellei varsinaisesti sada. Illaksi on luvattu kirkastuvaa, saa nähdä ehtiikö aurinkokin mukaan kuvaan.
Kello kahdeltatoista sade jatkuu, ensin tihkuen ja sitten yhä voimistuen. Nyt alan jo tottua siihen, tiedän, että kun kastun pääsen kuitenkin pian sisään lämpimään kuivattelemaan. Taivas on lähes tasaisen harmaa, hiukan vaihtelua on pilvien harmaan sävyissä. Se ei kuitenkaan näy kuvassa, johon mahtuvat vain kuusien ja mäntyjen alaoksat. Ensimmäinen, isompi kivi on itse asiassa vanhan koivun juurella. Pienempi kivi kauempana on lähellä kuusta, jonka oksat muodostavat kuvan yläreunaan rimpsuverhon. Taustalla oikealla kaksi mäntyä seisoo vierekkäin, hiukan toisiinsa päin kallellaan, niiden punertavat rungot näyttävät kuvassa melkein luonnottoman punaisilta.
Kello kahdelta sataa edelleen. Hetken näytti siltä kuin aurinko tulisi esiin, tai ainakin pilviverho vaikutti ohuemmalta, sillä verannan lattialla näkyi selvät varjot. Mutta se oli vain hetken. Kuvassa päivän eteneminen, valon suunnan muuttuminen ei näy, sillä pilvet hajauttavat auringon valon tasaiseksi kentäksi. Sen sijaan että nimeäisin työn “Istun kivellä” vanhan vuoden 2003 työn mallin mukaan, “Sadepäivä kivellä” voisi olla osuvampi nimitys: “Rainy Day on a Rock.” Mutta ehkä vielä on liian aikaista miettiä nimeä, kun olen hädin tuskin puolivälissä, enkä edes sitä, mikäli sittenkin jatkaisin läpi yön.
Kello neljältä sade jatkuu. Säätiedotuksen mukaan nyt pitäisi kirkastua muutamaksi tunniksi, mutta taivas väittää muuta. Hiljainen tihkusade jatkuu ja jatkuu. Sadepäivä kivellä, siitä ei ole epäilystäkään. Liikennettä on enemmän iltapäivällä, tai sitten kaikki autot vain sattuivat ajamaan ohi juuri kun istuin kivellä, tai oikeammin, nojasin kiveen. Päivä jatkuu samanlaisena, on kuin olisin eksynyt johonkin harmaaseen putkeen ajan ja elämän ulkopuolella, jossa kaikki jatkuu ennallaan. Se tuntuu hullulta, sillä toistamalla saman kuvan pyrin nimenomaan osoittamaan miten kaikki muuttuu hetki hetkeltä. Ja nyt tuntuu että mikään ei muutu. Mutta ehkä se on vain illuusio, kuvitelma, ja kun katson materiaalit huomaan pienenpienet muutokset, joita en näin parin tunnin välein kivellä istuessani havaitse.
Kello kuudelta sade vihdoinkin taukosi. En tohdi sanoa että lakkasi, sillä illaksi on luvattu lisää sadetta, mutta juuri nyt jopa aurinko kajastaa pilvien läpi ja ilmassa on vain kosteutta, ei enää sadepisaroita. Pieni tuulenvire luoteesta ravistelee vettä puista ja jo lännen suunnalta kajastava valo antaa aavistaa, että ilta on tulossa. Vain pari istuntoa enää, ellen sitten päätä jatkaa läpi yön. Ja vaikka jatkaisinkin, kun kerran aloitin jo varhain aamulla, ei niitä ole kovin monta jäljellä. Kymmeneen asti jatkan joka tapauksessa. Ja toivon että aurinko vielä paistaisi ihan kunnolla, ja muuttaisi maiseman.
Kello kahdeksalta näyttää, että sade todella lakkasi. Ilma tuntuu raikkaalta ja taivas on kirkkaampi, vaikkakin pilvien peitossa. Huomasin, että olen jo onnistunut tallomaan selvän polun heinikkoon ja kivellä kamerajalustan luona on saappaideni jättämät syvät painaumat. Myös isomman kiven kyljessä, paikassa johon olen nojannut, on jälki, ja kiven juurella sammal on repeytynyt pois jalkojeni alta ja paljastanut multaisen kiven. Pienemmänkin kiven juurella jalkani ovat talloneet maan esiin. Päivässä syntyy polku, ja myös paljon tuhoa. Mutta onneksi ruoho kasvaa pian ennalleen, ja samoin sammal, vaikkakin hitaammin.
Kello kymmeneltä sataa taas, ja tällä kertaa ihan kunnolla. Alkaa hämärtää, aurinko laskee jo tunnin kuluttua, mutta kameran valotusmittari pitää yllä tasaista vihreää. Kuinkahan siniseksi valon on muututtava, jotta se näkyisi kuvassa? Ihan jo senkin takia täytyy jatkaa ainakin puoleen yöhön asti. Illan tullen hyttysetkin ovat havahtuneet. Kaikki tämä vesi on niille mannaa, mutta kylmä sää on pitänyt ne kurissa tähän saakka. Nyt ne ovat liikkeellä ja saalistamassa sateesta huolimatta. Ilta tummenee, mutta tuskin tulee kokonaan pimeää.
Kello on kaksitoista, keskityö, ja sataa edelleen. Ei ole pimeää mutta sen verran hämärää, että kamerakin tunnistaa muutoksen. Metsän vihreys on niin voimakas ettei hämärästä tule sinistä vaan vain tummemman vihreää. Kun istun kivellä tai nojaan kiveen viimeistä kertaa ja tunnen pisaroiden valuvan kasvoilleni, mietin miten hurjaa olisi viettää yö ulkosalla. Jokainen eläin joutuu etsimään kolon johon suojautua sateelta, ja ihminenkin voisi yrittää löytää kallion kielekkeen tai kuusen jonka suojaan käpertyä. Mutta on kieltämättä ihanaa päästä sisään lämpimään taloon. Lopetan vuorokauden tähän, yöhön, ja hyväksyn sen, ettei aina voi palata alkuun ja aloittaa alusta. Tässä vielä lopuksi viimeinen kuva vihreydestä kesäyönä.
Practicing Embodied Cognition in June
Standing on the hill in front of the camera and walking down to sit on the rock below the slope, during this one session in June, made me aware of the small windmill again. It is the only feature in the environment that has visibly changed since I sat on the same rock once a week for a year twelve years ago. At that time I was interested in recording the seasonal changes in the environment during one year. Now my focus is on changes that have taken place during these years in between. Which reminds me of the notion of the excluded middle, and the environment as one example of that, discussed in an article by Jondi Keane, “Æffect: Initiating Heuristic Life” in Barrett & Bolt (eds.) Carnal Knowledge – Towards a ‘New materialism’ through the Arts I. B. Tauris 2013.
According to Keane a new materialism must be built on the subtle difference initiated by embodied reality sensitive to Æffects and prompted by atmospheric intricateness. (Keane 2013, 61) His notion Æffect is “a relational/corelational tool devised to help one learn how to negotiate the material processes of self-organisation.” Practicing embodied cognition, or distributing the mind throughout the body and into the environment, means “first, the recognition of the role of the environment in the co-selection of the organism-person-surround”, that is, “cognition as perception and action”, and “second the role of abstract relationships in the coordination of the organism-person-surround”, that is, “cognition as attention, emphasis, and the production of value-based distinctions”. (Keane 2013, 60)
What would that mean in terms of my sitting on a rock once a month? Or in terms of documenting visits to the same place regularly? I do recognise the role of the environment in what Keane would call the organism-person-surround of me sitting on the cold rock among young birches bending in the wind and geese walking around followed by their young. I am not observing and reflecting but rather engaging in actions in order to perceive. And I do admit that I focus my attention on some parts of the environment and put more emphasis and value on some aspects, like the familiar rock and the view of the open sea. And that my eyes are intent on noticing changes since my last visit in May, like the full-grown leaves of the birches or the profusion of violets blooming on the cliffs.
Mountain Brooks Once More
In springtime water is everywhere in the mountains. All the snow has to go somewhere, so it runs, flows, falls in trickles and cascades down the slopes in various forms of brooks and rivulets. In Kilpisjärvi I was experimenting with recording them, focusing on the small ones. I recorded the sound and took some snapshots of all the murmuring creeks I crossed on my path. When I looked at the snapshots on my comptuer I was disappointed at first; the grey sky was reflected in the water and produced strangely bland and flat pictures. After seeing many variations i realized that these snapshots are actually more fascinating than the recordings. I posted some on the ArsBioarctica blog as well:
Recording the small mountainbrooks in Kilpisjärvi reminded me of the very first video work I did on my own in 1999 in Centre D’Arte i Natura in Farrera de Pallars in the Catalonian Pyrenées. There I followed two small mountain brooks to the point of their confluence, and combined the material with some fragments from an essay on exactitude by Italo Calvino, some images of me walking down the slopes and some medieval music. The four channel installation was formed into a table and you could listen to the sounds with headphones.
Where the sea begins
In writing about exactitude Italo Calvino mentions two symbols that are used to describe the process of formation of living beings, the flame and the crystal. “Crystal and flame: two forms of perfect beauty that we cannot tear our eyes away from, two modes of growth in time, of expenditure of the matter surrounding them, two moral symbols, two absolutes, two categories for classifying facts and ideas, styles and feelings.” (Calvino 1993, p 71) Though Calvino speaks about literature, those two images or ideals are relevant even for one who makes performances; “in a live performance these two forms of existence are united a performance is both a composition and an event (communicative field) even if the emphasis between them can shift and the creation process can follow either path.” (Arlander 1998, p 155)
When I started to plan this work in autumn 1999, those two images evoked different questions. Could water perhaps be a third? I had worked with water sounds as material for a radio play and noticed, that it was an interesting starting point to think of water as a metaphoric solvent, where both factual and fictional destinies and stories melt and mix and which reflects them in a distorted form. Water could also be related to radio as a medium, or the media flow more generally formless, sipping in everywhere, melting everything together to sameness. Nevertheless I was fascinated by the idea of Joseph Brodsky that water is the image of time. “Should the world be designated a genre, its main stylistic device would no doubt be water.” (Brodsky 1992, s 124) According to him a thought itself possesses a water pattern, as one’s emotions and even one’s handwriting.
Could water, like the crystal and the flame, be a form of `perfect beauty that we cannot tear our eyes away from’? And Gould we perhaps continue with the analogy? What is water’s mode of growth in time? To flow, to unite with other waters, to “return to the sea”. And what is its expenditure of the matter surrounding it? To erode, to carry along, to solve into oneself or to reflect. But water not only consumes, it also nourishes. As a symbol as well as in practice water is necessary for life, `the water of life’, which purifies, refreshes and heals. When it is polluted, it feels almost as deeply terrifying as if the earth would tremble or the sky fall down. And in what way is water be a moral symbol, an absolute? Lao Tzu says: “Highest good is like water. Because water excels in benefiting the myriad creatures without contending with them and settles where none would like to be, it comes close to the way.” (Lao Tzu 1963, s 64) And: “In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it. This is because there is nothing that can take its place.” (Lao Tzu 1963, s 140) Calvino speaks of a “Party of the Crystal” and a “Party of the Flame” in twentieth century literature. What would the poets of a “Party of Water” be like? How Gould water be used as a category for classifying facts and ideas, styles and feelings? The continuous, endless flow of water can be associated at least with the stream of consciousness, with everything that flows, like for instance text. In Chinese mythology water represents communication, in Western astrology it stands for emotion. For me the most beautiful thing with water is how it adapts to the environment, flows with its surroundings but always retains its uniqueness; evaporates, condenses to drops, freezes, melts and flows again, but remains always irrevocably and inexorably what it is water.
In September 1999 when I went to Centre D’Art i Natura in the village Farrera in the Pyrenees to explore what a mountains landscape sounds like, I was a little scared at the thought of staying for a whole month so far from the sea. Once there I immediately realized, that the blue mountains on the horizon were excellent surrogates, like waves turned to stone. The strongest audible element of the landscape was the murmur of mountain brooks, which I at once fell in love with. While climbing up the slopes following the routes formed by the brooks 1 also understood that here `the sea begins’.
I video filmed the two branches of a small brook, Barranc de Farrera, until the point where they unite below the village. From there the brook continues towards the village of Glorieta, where it joins another brook, Barranc de Burg, and at the bottom of the valley the river Noguera Pallaresa, which flows as a bigger stream toward the plains, the river Segre, Ebro and the Mediterranean. I filmed the journey of the brooks very simply; close ups of c. one minute at five to fifteen meters intervals, without camera stand or zoom, with automatic light adjustment, downstream, even if the waterfalls of course looked more magnificent upstream from below. I thought I would document a few moments on their path, to learn how to see, to take pictures, to be patient. I wanted to be ascetic and get for one moment away from my own preferences, stories, intensity and fiction. I hoped the work would be a humble tribute to the multiplicity of nature and at the same time an exercise in (towards) exactness. Later I noticed, that what I thought was exact was nothing of the sort, but rather sloppy after all. I also understood that exactness, exactitude, is basically absurd as an aim. Nothing in water is exact.
Sources:
Arlander, Annette: Esitys tilana, Acta Scenica 2, Teak 1998.
Brodsky, Joseph: Watermark, The Noonday Press Farrar, Straus & Giroux 1992.
Calvino, Italo: Six Memos for the Next Millennium, translated by Patrick Creagh Vintage books 1993.
Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching translated by D. C. Lau, Penguin Classics 1963.
That was almost fifteen years ago. Now in June 2014, one day in Kilpisjärvi, I came by a beautiful waterfall near the village, and was hypnotised by the force of the water again. Today video technology is much improved.The still images show a moment of the movement which is not discernible with human eyes, the splashing is frozen into an image which changes every second. The images with only water are the most abstract but also the most interesting ones. There is no grass, no shore, no fixed landmark to hold on to:
Meeting Malla Again
Back at the ArsBioarctica Residency at the biological station of Helsinki University in Kilpisjärvi, far up in the north, close to the Norwegian border and the Arctic Sea. The exact coordinates are 69 degrees 2′ 38″ North and 20 degrees 48′ 13″ East, and only 488 meters above sea level, if my phone is to be trusted.
The first time I visited this place, nearly two months ago, there was more than 150 cm snow, and now most of that is gone. Quite a lot still remains, though, and there is still ice on the lake. My plan is to do a sequel to the video work I recorded here in April, although this time it is not possible to walk out on the ice. And this time a colleague helps me by sending me a prompt, a poem or idea or something to use as an impulse or starting point. It is exciting to experience the light here, since it is really overwhelming, energizing and exhausting at the same time. This time I am planning to climb up to Saana Fell, too, and managed to get fairly high already on my first day. (see images below) I am describing my experiments and experiences, writing more or less daily, on the residency blog, which can be found here.
Malla seen from the slope of Saana 4.6.2014
Sista morgonen
Mulet, regn, nordlig vind 10 m/s, + 8 grader varmt (eller kallt) är inte precis vad man väntar sig en morgon i slutet på maj, men det är omständigheterna för min sista gryning (eller gråning) med soluppgång klockan 4.10 eller 4.14 beroende på auktoritet. När det är helt mulet är skillnaden i ljus obetydlig. Men nu är det alltså gjort, färdigt, slut.
Gårdagens och dagens tagning skall ännu editeras med på slutet av videon, som skall vara med på öppningen av utställningen ikväll. Grått, blåsigt, ingen försonande final. Och i det här vädret kan man undra ifall någon vågar sig ut till ön för att se en sommarutställning ikväll. Jag har valt att använda en minut av varje morgon, så hela videon blir 24 minuter. Och visst finns det skira rodnader med också. Men om man jämför med besväret att passa soluppgången, eller ögonblicket innan, är resultatet minst sagt blygsamt. Så är det tyvärr ofta med mina projekt.
Av någon anledning hittar jag ofta på olika slags prövningar eller uthållighetstest som sedan ger ringa avkastning. Kanske det är ett slags snedvridet arv från performance konstens glansdagar. Men det är ju inga verkliga prövningar eller riskfyllda utmaningar, utan snarare smått utmattande upprepningar. Ursprungligen handlade det väl om att fånga tidens gång, att på något sätt skildra de små förändringarna som oupphörligen äger rum. Men så småningom har det blivit ett maner, en inkörd tankebana som jag faller in i smått automatiskt. Kanske det är dags att pröva på andra arbetssätt?
Hur som helst är det nu slut på det roliga. Det enda som återstår är att slipa slutresultatet och lägga fram det i en liten monitor tillsammans med de två varianterna av ormens år i gungan. Och även om videon Before Sunrise (Mornings in May), som jag valt att kalla den, inte precis kommer till sin rätt som ett bihang till installationen här på utställningen Vattenbilder, som sommarutställningen på Stora Räntan kallas i år, kan jag ju försöka göra något av materialet senare. Nu är det i alla fall skönt att få komma härifrån, så småningom.
Slow Film
This dawn began with a storm. Perhaps 8 m/s is not considered a storm officially, but when it blows from northeast it feels brisk enough. And the aspen, famous for shivering in the slightest breeze, are no longer trembling but shaking. Today is the penultimate morning I am going to record, and I had of course hoped for some interesting cloud formations combined with coloured skies, but no, the sun was hidden by a uniform grey cloud cover at sunrise 4.12. or 4.14.
Yesterday I edited the previous mornings into a test version, 22 minutes, with one minute for each morning, and decided to continue with today and tomorrow and add them at the end for a final version only tomorrow morning. And in case something would not work I would in any case have this test version to show. All in all there will be 24 mornings of 30 on tape. In the beginning, after a few sessions, there is a small jump in the framing, in consequence of the camera tripod falling in the storm while I was away in Stockholm. The wind today has nothing close to that kind of force. The rest of the images are then fairly similar, so the changes move smoothly.
The choice of clip duration, 60 seconds, is arbitrary, although I remember from before that a rhythm created by 30 second clips is fairly slow, so with 60 seconds you probably will hardly notice a rhythm at all. There is enough time for becoming aware of some small events within the clips, like birds flying by or a boat passing; the increasing light is not visible to the eye, though. If the average duration of a shot in a mainstream movie is 2 seconds, these images are slow indeed.
Slow film is a phenomenon related to ecocinema, I hear. Actually I read about it in an essay written by a student, and immediately ordered the book in question, an anthology called Ecocinema – Theory and Practice, edited by Stephen Rust, Salma Monani and Sean Cubitt (Routledge 2013). Film studies is a field I am not at all familiar with, but this seemed like something interesting. And the idea that one needs to use long shots and to slow down the frequency of image changes in order to be able to see what is going on in the environment makes sense. But of course there is a risk of slowing down too much, so the viewer gets bored and stops watching altogether. In an exhibition situation one can play with the balance between an image which seems static, so the changes come as a surprise, and a rhythmic change, which is spellbinding as such.
In the test version some of the clip changes were so smooth that it was hard to notice whether the image actually changed or not, and that was my ideal to begin with. The effect of the smooth changes is rather peculiar, though, because it creates and illusion of a continuous morning, which is not the point. I decided to call the work Before Sunrise (Mornings in May) because without knowing that all clips are taken before sunrise one could imagine some of the grey ones depicting the afternoon. I refrained from giving it a poetic or conceptual title that could provide some kind of specific meaning and preferred to leave it open to meaninglessness.
Performing Landscape 