Αγαπημένοι μου φίλοι,
Ελπίζω το μήνυμά μου να σας βρίσκει ασφαλείς, υγιείς και δυνατούς.
Καθώς διανύουμε μια περίοδο σκοτεινή και ακροσφαλή, όπου η σκέψη μας μπαλαντζάρει ανάμεσα στον επάνω και τον κάτω κόσμο, αποφάσισα να επικοινωνήσω με κάποιους διάσπαρτους ανά τον κόσμο φίλους μου, με έναν πιο δημιουργικό τρόπο. Αποφάσισα να σας καλέσω να συντάξουμε ένα ερασιτεχνικό ημερολόγιο καραντίνας. Θέλω να μάθω μέσα από snapshots πώς βιώνετε αυτή την περίοδο, αυτή την ημέρα. Και ποιά θα είναι τα συναισθήματά μας όταν θα κοιτάξουμε πάλι αυτές τις εικόνες μετά από λίγους μήνες;
Όσο απίθανο κι αν μας πρωτοακούστηκε, η εμφάνιση του covid-19 έχει επηρεάσει μονορούφι όλο τον πλανήτη, όμως οι συνθήκες περιορισμού μας από τον δημόσιο χώρο, τα συναισθήματα που μας προκαλεί, ο τρόπος με τον οποίο τον “ανεχόμαστε” παραμένει προσωπικός. Αυτές τις προσωπικές συνθήκες, ή τις καθημερινές ιεροτελεστίες που προέκυψαν, τις εξόδους και τις εισόδους μας, αυτές είναι που θα ήθελα να καταγράψουμε.
Αν λοιπόν η προτασή μου σας βρίσκει σύμφωνους, συγκεντρώστε εως και 5 φωτογραφίες με το κινητό σας, τον μικρόκοσμο ή τον μεγαλόκοσμό σας, την πόλη σας, το σούπερ μάρκετ, το εγκλωβισμένο σας σώμα ή την ρουτίνα σας και στείλτε τις μαζί με ένα κειμενάκι.
Ας μην ξεχνάμε ότι στο DNA του ο ιός αυτός φέρει πολύ μοναξιά. Άνθρωποι που νοσούν πέφτουν σε απόλυτη απομόνωση. Ας μην απομονωθούμε.
Με αγάπη
Κλεοπάτρα
Dear friends,
As I am going through this very obscure and precarious period where my mind is balancing in between the upper and the under world, I have decided to reach out and communicate in a more creative way with friends from around the world. I’ve decided to put together a creative international “diary” of our internment days, and how each one of us experiences this period.
Amazingly as it is, the case of covid-19 has affected the whole world, however, the conditions under which covid-19 is restricting each one of us, the sentiments it evokes, the way we grin and bear it, remains a personal. These personal conditions and intimate procedures or daily rituals, exits or entrances, are the ones I wish to gather.
If my proposal finds you in agreement to express yourself, please create a photographic sequence -max 4 photos- concerning your micro world, your daily routine, your city, your partner or your family, your supermarket or your trapped body, your solitude or your neighbor from afar…or anything else that accompanies you during these days.
Lets not forget that unfortunately, covid-19 carries loneliness in its DNA…
Matthew Johnson, Principal at Diller Scofidio+Renfro, N.Y.
[Biking through the neighborhood today was all short of complex feels]
Lydia Venieri, Artist, Ν.Υ.
[2020 fashion statement | A Quarantine proposal | includes mosquito net for the summer]
Dr. Sozita Goudouna, Art Curator, N.Y.
Washington
Melissa, Summer and Rebekah
About Spaceship Thrupple:
During this period of Covid, shelter- in- place, social-distancing, and questioning what is essential this Thrupple has assembled in various ways to weather the storms that are ahead. We have spent a lot of time romping around in our garden and extracting roots from carpet of roots out there in that yard. We have made the interior of the house a plant nursery; from edibles to beautiful tropical plants. There has been days with tears and lots of time to sleep and dream. We even have a squirrel family with 6 babies living under our solar panels on the roof. We have found ways to make space for each other with the essentials and simplest things. Finding the most humble things within the space of our garden to produce wine and pesto and medicines. And of course we have been on too many Zoom calls, though we are grateful we also remember that we are satiated by the simplest things.
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We are happy here on our spaceship and are looking forward to meeting you in the new world we are sailing toward.
Summer, Rebekah, Melissa
LONDON
Kirsty Purnell, Teacher+Mover, London/England
“House Party”
Keity Pook, Choreographer, London
MYKONOS
Despoina Nazou, Social Anthropologist
Στη Μύκονο σε καραντίνα!
Navajo versus Covid-19
‘Wind in my heart. Dust in my head…’
Σε περιπατητικές μαγικές τελετές για τον ‘ιερό Αέρα μέσα μας’ και ξόρκια για τον μιαρό εκπνεόμενο του κορονοϊού. Και με παρηγορητικές σκέψεις για τις κοσμογονικές μας ανάσες από τον David Abram*. «Με όλα όσα έχουν ζωή, με όλα όσα έχουν τη δύναμη του λόγου, με όλα όσα έχουν τη δύναμη να αναπνέουν, με όλα όσα έχουν τη δύναμη να διδάσκουν και να καθοδηγούν, με αυτά όλα θα ζήσουμε σε ευλογία». Για τους ινδιάνους Navajo, ο Αέρας -ιδιαίτερα η ικανότητά του να παρέχει συνειδητότητα, σκέψη και ομιλία – έχει ιδιότητες που ο ευρωπαϊκός αλφαβητικός πολιτισμός αποδίδει παραδοσιακά σ’ ένα εσώτερο, ατομικό ανθρώπινο «μυαλό» ή «ψυχή». Ωστόσο, αποδίδοντας αυτές τις δυνάμεις στον Αέρα, και ισχυριζόμενοι ότι «oι Άνεμοι μέσα μας» είναι απόλυτα συνεχείς και ενιαίοι με τον άνεμο γενικά –δηλαδή με το αόρατο μέσο στο οποίο βυθίζουμε την ύπαρξή μας – οι πρεσβύτεροι Νavajo πιστεύουν ότι το ‘μυαλό’ δεν είναι ‘δικό’ μας, δεν είναι ανθρώπινη ιδιοκτησία. Αντίθετα, το μυαλό ως ‘Άνεμος’ είναι μια ιδιότητα του περιβάλλοντος κόσμου που την κατέχουν εξίσου άνθρωποι και όλα τ’ άλλα όντα. Για πολλούς από τους αυτόχθονες πληθυσμούς του πλανήτη ο αέρας, ο άνεμος και η αναπνοή, είναι πτυχές μιας και μοναδικής ιερής δύναμης. Ο αέρας, και η αναπνοή για τις προφορικές κοινωνίες είναι το αρχέτυπο όλων όσων είναι αναπόφευκτα, άγνωστα, αλλά και αναμφισβήτητα πραγματικά . Οι προφανείς δεσμοί τους με τον λόγο – κυρίως με την αίσθηση ότι οι προφορικές λέξεις είναι δομημένη ανάσα και ότι οι προφορικές φράσεις παίρνουν τη δική τους επικοινωνιακή δύναμη από αυτό το αόρατο μέσο που κινείται μεταξύ μας – προσδίδει στον αέρα βαθιά σύνδεση με τη γλωσσική έννοια και με τη σκέψη. Πολλοί αυτόχθονες λαοί αντιλήφθηκαν τη συνειδητότητα ή το «μυαλό», όχι ως δύναμη που βρίσκεται μέσα στο κεφάλι τους, αλλά ως ‘κατάσταση’ μέσα στην οποία βρίσκονται οι ίδιοι μαζί με τα άλλα ζώα και τα φυτά, τα βουνά και τα σύννεφα. Σε αυτήν την καραντίνα είμαι Navajo / Wind in my heart. Dust in my head (Talking Heads)
*D. Abram, 1997 “The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World”
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AUSTRALIA – ATHENS
[Stuck in the El. Venizelos airport]
Richard Lucas, Set Designer
From a very ‘empty’ flight, slowly streaming to a very empty arrival area. One luggage belt only whirring away….I’ll get mine in Thessaloniki. Taking the escalator up to Departures…..11.45 am….20 hours to kill….. looking up one way then down the other….. an immense empty entrance hall, just me and a few other ghosts hanging, wandering around, or somehow working. Pause.
I made it to Greece. 31 hours since I started my journey from Sidney…
Now and then footsteps disappearing into the distance into the quiet.
I glance towards the security check area…. Only one or two staff, nobody waiting…. no one beyond…. Surreal emptiness. Pause.
I’ve whittled away an hour and a half….. still feeling fine, though I haven’t found a place to relax and rest….extensive marble floors. Empty shops. Shutters down. Furniture stacked up blockading eateries….. a few bored employees, wondering hither thither, knowing not what is going on. The only open eatery ….. a single person serving the almost non existing customers…. Each respective worker nonchalantly at their post with a tinge of anarchy. I grab a sandwich…. and continue my pursuit. Pause.
Looking up new possibilities appear….Timidly I take the escalator. Of the very few people I see below, nobody notices or even cares. More closed and empty premises….. oooh big and empty. Television mumbling to itself…. The news, and two screens with departures for an empty airport. Looking into Hungry Jacks….. empty…. A few stools and chairs barricading the entrance, one has been turned slightly towards the television that sits up high, backing onto the security area below that not even a ghost passes through. Pause.
Door opens from the end of a corridor…… a person walks towards me and passes. Continuing on along the balcony corridor, we ignore each other pretending we are not there…… the news continues….. footsteps fade into the murmur of the couple of security attendants below. I look back at the chair … no one watching television now. Pause.
A slight opening and I easily slip through, stealthy and quickly moving in, turning the corner and out of sight….. dark at the back …… cashiers and a serving bar….. I am the only ghost. Windows … windows…. Out over the whole empty tarmac…. No ghost planes… no movement….. just the morning sky and the wind…. Quiet inside, expansive…. Eerie. Weird. Surreal. Spectral. I take a booth by the window, I sit half out of sight, with an ear and an eye out….. Will anyone come? What am I doing?
I hide my bag under against the bench, lie down on the short narrow bench.
Sleep soon takes over…. I awake….. Im still here…. No one has come…. The day is preparing to wane into night. Pause
I sit up …. Feeling better…. Its definitely bizarre here…I feel more at ease….. I wonder around perusing the whole joint….(cheap hangout, definitely that). Sitting in a lounge chair….. almost in sight…. No good. A corner with a long bench behind a few tables….. I sit looking out to the windows…… so much better, this is my spot….. why had I not previously explored a little more? My apprehension has subsided….. its almost comfortable in all its weirdness. Hiding my bag under the table….. Hardly to be seen in the dwindling daylight and creepy green ceiling lights…..I venture out back into the corridor…. Annexed to the left is a bathroom, safety red tape blocks the open entrance as I swiftly glide under and move towards the fortunately unlocked door. Clean, empty and quiet….. My own personal bathroom…. I will visit it again a few times before day breaks and I move on into departures. As I gaze out the windows, night adorns the emptiness. From my ‘desk’ a serenity slowly pervades , an inner peace slows the heart rate and the night grows on. I nibble on some munchies that help fill my bag…. Add an extra layer to help keep in the warmth …… Pause.
And I chill, so to speak….I pull out my laptop and watch some series…. Or not. Pause.
A large empty fast food place is now my haven. Shadows my companions, green lights my guides…. Emptiness my savior. Pause.
I am almost home.
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PERU
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Eliana Otta, Artist
“To live the ideas until finding the words”
SWEDEN
Dilyara Alimbayeva, Lawyer
“As you know, Sweden took an unusual approach in fighting the coronavirus.
Sweden has left its primary schools, restaurants, gyms and stores open throughout the spread of the pandemic. Instead, the government has urged citizens to act responsibly and follow social distancing guidelines. We try to stay at home as much as possible – my husband is in IT and he works from home, my daughter is a teenager and she is on distance education. My 6-year old son goes to school every day as usual.
On rare occasions we allow ourselves a treat of going together to a park or an open-air stadium.”
SPAIN
Marcos Rodriguez, Accountant Manager
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SWITZERLAND
Olivia Schuler-Voith, Costume designer
I found myself in Switzerland when Covid-19 turned into a pandemic. Whenever I zone out of my own microcosm and read the daily news, I realize again and again how fortunate I am and I grow more and more grateful each time. I find myself at peace in these moments. I have only just begun to nurse my wounded globalized existence.
Can live without: flying, spending time (so much of of my time) at airports, delayed flights, canceled flights, missing my flights, booking flights, canceling flights, rebooking flights, spending money on extensive unnecessary traveling, unhealthy adrenalin, being in a rush, running late for meetings, feeling pressured, feeling a constant lack of time, never making time, not listening properly, too many open tabs, going for dinners, lunches, coffees, tea, keeping busy, buying random things I don’t need, not opening my mail, not answering my emails, taking public transport, trying to breath in overly polluted air, making excuses, ignoring my feelings, my health, ignoring myself, my life style, crowds, noise, greed, nonchalance, cruise ships, mass tourism, over consumption, general neglect, disrespect, having too many options, being bombarded by options, prioritizing the wrong things, the feeling of missing out, not being able to enjoy and appreciate things enough for what they are, chronic dissatisfaction
What feels good now:
being, just being, looking out of the window and just looking out of the window, watching Kenneth Clark’s civilization, talking to people on the phone, listening, walking in nature, being in nature, listening to birds, hearing my neighbors, feeling protected and cared for, feeling satisfied with much less, reading, observing, being heard, people making time, create, the idea of deceiving myself that “all will turn out well – people will learn from this catastrophe – that nature will recover and forgive us – politicians, governments, industries, will come to terms and capitulate to nature, to creation – admitting to ourselves that, after all, we ‘re small, we are humans who can’t handle/solve/fix everything -that we grow modest and humble and respectful and kind and forgiving -we will grow up, we will foster the good within us, we will live simpler but more intensely – and are grateful and hybrid – we will finally pay respect to each creature of this planet, we will let ourselves be governed by love and hope, – not by our own selfishness. We shall truthfully live by what is given to us from above.
