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mardi 29 mars 2011

An Artist Talks Forum Performance/Performing? 12.03.2011, Kunsthaus Tacheles.


The artist Anna Kaluza, fantastic saxophone player, and is a very active musician in Berlin. You can hear her play in the fijan, the Bflat  and other jazz or experimental music spaces.
She has recenty founded The Berlin Experimental Orchestra, and has a number of 25 musicians all together in the project. She shares her experience of London, where she stayed for a year and played in the London Experimental Orchestra, she likes the interaction with musicians and the improvisation part of the music production. She rarely composes in advance and likes to create live, while playing with the Orchestra and react to other musicians' melodies and sounds.
She played for the first time live for the talk with Michaela Hartmann and her companion guitarist Ernesto, once to open the talk and again before leaving for a concert.
She is a sensitive and open minded artist, and it was a great pleasure to have her present. She may come back in April for a personnal talk on a thursday, check the facebook events. She is playing on the second of April in Das Büro, with Monster Trio and friends...





Michaela Hartmann and Ernesto have played 5 times together, een though they are together since 2 years and, their relashionship to performing music has naturally evolved over the years. They are open to different sorts of music and are still open to new experiences and will play with Anna Kaluza again. Michaela likes the experimental instrument she has built because it is unusual and people stop and take time to listen. In comparaison to some places where you play and the publis keeps on talking...
She likes the attention created and the strong impact it has on the viewers/ audience.





Olesh is a graffiti painter, who has bean painting in the streets for more than 15 years... He is used to the hostility of the public. He says that 90% of the viewers are against what he is creating. In response to that he has built an protection and can paint in difficult situations without being disturbed.
He has had experiences with gangs of taggers competing each other, and developed friendships in the streets. Today, he likes Berlin, because there are still spaces for this street art.






Miriam Wuttke came to join in the second part of the talk, where she explains how her performances evolve and are contructed, often in three parts, like a theater play, with strong visual impact on the audience, that plays an important role in the development of the performance itself. 
Sometimes her character will take off her clothes and walk naked blind folded. She is more focused on the transfomation and change of state of mind, than the actual nudity. Her characters need to be free. She needs to follow her instinct, and feel what is right when the story unfolds. She gives birth, she shoots, she climbs ladders and still remains extremely feminin and childish at the same time.
The public can only sinck into her tales and follow the flow of the story. Her story, her characters, dancing in between life and death birth and rebirth, control no control...which is also, the title of a series of performances involving self-bondage.

 

lundi 21 mars 2011

An Artist Talks with Elya May and Aleph Art Proekt, 10 March 2011, Kunsthaus of Tacheles.

Elya is a Russian artist, who lived partly in Australia, where she finished her studies in Art.
Elya May performing with Aleph Art Proekt for the musical "the House of Dreams"

 She is living in Berlin since a few years and has built up a performance project that works with a Dada inspiration and improvisation. The character she performs, is sort of a free woman, as if she allows herself more in the performance, than in real life. She can wear crazy outfits and undress, as she pleases, she is a rockstar or a nymphette, peu importe, as long as she goes beyond barriers constructed by others...
Many artist involved in acting and playing live instruments within the Aleph Art proekt.

She is a mother and it is of course a challenge for an artist, her little girl is there constantly by her side during the interview and she calmly manages the situation.
Again in the House of Dreams February 12 2011, kunsthaus Tacheles


Elya is a determined artist, who does not feel the desire to conceptualize in her works and paintings... She feels that the non_concept can also be a sort of statement against the general direction today in the contemporary art scene, overloaded with conceptual art and non formal productions sometimes difficult to access for the viewer.


Live musicians intergrate the performance
She likes to be simple, and yet has alot to say, and continues to beleive there is a place for other types of art and art production.

mercredi 9 mars 2011

An Artist Talks with Marcel Martin, 03.03.2011, Tacheles, Berlin


Marcel Martin (born 19.11.1982) is a very busy artist and musician. He arrived from a rehearsal and took time for the interview, just, before another rehearsal later in the evening: He is full of energy and life.

Photo Olivia Güthling

He studied Jazz Guitar in the FMW Academy in Frankfurt a.M. (www.fmw.de) and teaches now, in a music school in Berlin to children. He likes the contact with the youth, although, it can be very demanding and exhausting to teach to so many little individuals, and sometimes deal with parents' expectations... ( he has 25 pupills)
He is leader in the MMT trio and has just released a second album „Ausserhalb“ alvailable online for sale (www.cdbaby.com/Artist/MMT). Also check the MMT-website.




He is always open to new experiences and likes the contact with other artists, he recently participated in the musical "House of Dreams" project created inside the Kunsthaus, and now is himself involved in the organization of the platform project "Fick Dein Projekt", a rock experimental jazz concert with live performances in between sets.

Photo Olivia Güthling

So he is living his dream in Berlin and this energy, he carries with him, is contagious. Please listen to his music on the differents links below and enjoy.


You are most welcome to "Fick Dein Projekt" concert on the 26st of March, Goldener Saal, Kunsthaus Tacheles, Oranienburgerstrasse 54/56, Berlin, Mitte.
(www.fick-dein-projekt.de)




Links:
www.myspace.com/marcelmartin
www.myspace.com/mmtjazz
www.fick-dein-projekt.de
www.myspace.com/whatawasteofbeauty
www.myspace.com/magicaltheatre
www.prokopaetz.de

lundi 7 mars 2011

An Artist Talks Forum Sprirituality , Beliefs and Rituals, 05.03.2011, Kunsthaus Tacheles, Berlin


It was a nice sunny day and we had guests: Dhiraj Roy a Hindhou Singer, Svetlana Singer from the US, Udo Wiegand actor, Pauline Payen video artist, Nicolas Puyjalon performer, Urszula actress and Alain Ledezma visual artist performer and musician.

Alain, Orvar artist name, began to explain how he works with the performances and his relationship to rituals. There is a historical reason to his interest since his country has strong roots in primitive practises and beliefs, related to the nature and its powers.
He tries to develop a personal approach and mixes different influences and cultures in his projects He need s to feel the energy of elements that represent life and nature to elaborate his performance and often does them with live experimental music: He is in a mystical dimension and wants to produce more music in the future.
www.wix.com/oorvar/orvar

Dhiraj Roy has already collaborated with sabia Khan in the performance No Man's Land, where he sings live inside the staircase of the Kunsthaus Tacheles. He studied singing at the university and has developed his beliefs throught the practise of the voice. He is a peace maker and participates often inter religious meetings , has been able to sing in Churchs, Mosqs and Temples.
He has discovered that occidental people are very open to his religion and finds many ressemblances in scriptures and writings from his religion and the Bible , for example. He gave us the great pleasure of his voice and sang for us.

Svetlana was visiting a studio and came to see, if she can work in the Kunsthaus Tacheles. She started to experiment working with meditation (chi) and has learnt a special kind of Asian meditation that she teaches now in her workshops. (see interview)
She searches new ways to develop her work and her body and mind together, to improve her capacities to perform, and find herself. She is both an actress and a singer. She is in an identity quest and explores possibilities that come her way.
She has recently pushed her research towards the ethnies of Gypsies from Roumania, and believes she is discovering maybe, a road to her roots.

Sabia Khan is the mediator and experienced the practise of rituals within performances. She has used several techniques, such as the buddhist mantra of the lotus sutra, Reiki and the Muslim prayers, to use as a guide the energy experienced to help the development of her performances. She recently performed, an Egyptian ritual named: "The ritual of the opening of the mouth", that was done to allow a dead person to start his new life, in the Egyptian belief.
Also, available to watch, the performance "No man's land", where both Udo Wiegand and Dhiraj Roy had participated. It took place in the Kunsthaus Tacheles. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlLdLbTTF6Q

Udo Wiegand is not using this kind of technique or energy but seems very open to acknowledging their use and maybe experimenting in Workshops. He uses his voice as a tool of course and has invited Svetlana to use the Theater Ixes for her work. Check the Ixes website for future workshops on meditating techniques.
www.ixes-berlin.webs.com

Video artist Pauline Payen shares her belief, but admits, not to use it on a professional level. She keeps it appart from her work. Although the themes she may be interested in, could have a meditative dimension, and the looped scenarios could almost be seen as little rituals, particularly the crashing of the eggs, in her video work named "l´éloges des absents se fait sans flatterie". The piece was recently show in the space 140 Skalitzer.
http://lecumedesjours.over-blog.org

Nicolas Puyjalon is a perfomance artist living in Berlin. He explained that he does usually not work with themes of beliefs and rituals.  But he remembers, that he can have certain rituals built around little objects. He wears a necklace to bring himself luck, and sees sometimes, that these built beliefs  have an influence on his behaviour and work. They determine his mood and sometimes are a trigger to open his strength while performing.
contemporaryperformance.org/profile/puyjalonnicolas








mercredi 2 mars 2011

An Artist Talks Forum Survival, Resistance, Werkschau Special, 26.02.2011, Kunsthaus Tacheles.

The discussion took place in the Neue Gallery among the works from the artists exhibiting in the Werschau 2011. 
Were present photographer Petrov Ahner, musician and painter Michaela Hartmann, Alexandr Rodin Bielorussian painter and visitor guest Nathalie Toye.


Petrov Ahner shared his experience as he first started to collaborate in the I support Tacheles project, where he has collected an amazing number of pictures from supporters, from all over the world. He discovered the importance of The Tacheles Kunsthaus, in the social cultural scene, and what it represents for people.
He started to organize Flash mob resistance activities. The goal was to enlarge the vision of the media and enhance the coverage of the campain, to save the tacheles. He is a very active photographer, and has started to exhibit his works in Berlin since 2010, (see  talks with  Petrov Ahner on Blog).

Alexander Rodin is a famous Bielorussian painter and his works describe the resistance as an artist in his project "Global Warning" ( see artist talk). He has experience of difficult regimes and knows how political pressure can weigh over the artist's creativity, and push them, in many cases, to move abroad. 
He has recently organized an exhibition in Minsk, and collaborates regularly with artists from Europe and Minsk. Within the Festival Dach, that has taken place in the Kunsthaus, he devellops cultural exchange between Bielorussia and Germany. "This free space, The Tacheles, is very well known by youth and artists", he says," in Bielorussia and symbolizes strongly the freedom of expression, that we have here in this part of the world".

But nevertheless, Michaela Hartmann underlines the fact that, even in Germany, because of material issues, and the dispute around the free spaces alike Tacheles, the survival of artists, can be also a battle. 
The artist working in an environment can be quickly caught up in difficulties,often some have an extra activity, and feel it is difficult to produce the art works in such conditions.

It was also discussed, that these difficult conditions to survive can be stimulating, in an unusual way. The artists in Bielorussia are very close, and the same phenomena appears in the Tacheles Kunsthaus, where artists join and devellop new projects, to save the free space.
These reactions, to political and economical pressure, this resistance/survival, is a know reaction  for artists,  and some times  becomes part of an important creative process...