FORM + LANGUAGE WORKSHOP | BAUHAUS 100 FESTIVAL
As we all liked to call it, "the best group therapy session", the Form and Language workshop took place during the Bauhaus 100 festival back in October. For an extended period of 12 hours, our speaking was restricted and we were only able to communicate through body language or written words, but only in our native language. The collective group hug started our workshop, but we also decided to end it the same way, and it made us realise how important it is to be able to be part of a group: to protest together, to understand each other, to comfort each other.
Also , as seen from a high angle, the group hug looks more like a circle than anything else, which is our main symbol to represent unity in the project.
In solidarity with the woman whom was shot in the eye by a police officer, other protestants covered one of their eye to show how they stand together and fight together: the idea of merging as a whole.
The protests took place in the first days of November 2015, just moments after the deadliest and most intense tragedy that took place in Bucharest since the Revolution gains the communist system in December 1989. A lot of people recall the 30th of October as the day when "Romania woke up" and started to fight for it's integrity, for its rights and for its people. Cutting a circle in the middle of the flag represents the symbol of revolution, as it was first seen on the streets in 1989.
"As a young photographer, Goldblatt set out to capture ‘the underbelly of the society that underlay South Africa’. He explained: ‘to understand it visually, I also had to get a grasp on the history of the country. So I did a degree, which included courses in English and economic history. This taught me how to think and understand what was happening around me.’ His images reflect this desire to understand the full context behind what is depicted."
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Michael Clark uses body language to communicate with his audience, and his "performances have been marked by a mixture of technical rigour and experimentation, intense and fine-tuned choreography intersecting with elements of punk, Dada, pop and rock. His productions repeatedly break new ground, provoking and electrifying audiences. As The Guardian noted of a recent performance at the Barbican, London: “throughout the evening, the dancers’ prodigious command and affectless efficiency make them look superhuman.”
"His elaborate shoots can entail hundreds to thousands of nude volunteers, who are captured in specific places of national interest, often with the goal of highlighting social or environmental concerns."
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Even though his work is more plain than it is textural, and more geometrical rather than fluid, he manages to create, tell and depict murals that not only engage with personal experiences, but encourages communities to participate and engage emotionally (and somethimes physically) in his work. His ongoing project, "Happy Face Project", creates a direct interaction between the architectural side of the city and the human one, bringing them closer. He spray paints old metal shutters in shapes of happy faces, only by using very exact, geometrical shapes, which made me think about how limiting yourself can make you become more engaged with the surroundings you're working with, as well as pushing yourself to create something new with what you already have.
GROUP MANIFESTO
WE MERGE AS ONE WITH THE COMMUNITY TO CREATE A WHOLE. WE NEED TO STOP AND THINK OF THOSE I. NEED, LET'S REALISE THE VALUE OF BEING TOGETHER, THE FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION.
MANIFESTO
I, as an artist living in a world of greys and I, as a human living in a world of frustration, have the aim to revolt and step over the ones who took away our freedom. I merge as one with the community to create a whole, to complete myself. I will blend my body with others to create poetry of many colours on paper, fabrics, streets and buildings. My rebellion will be my needle sewing on canvas of rage and madness, stitching them until they dissapear. I intend to transform rigid forms and neutral tones in bursts of dynamic lines and colourful hysterias to empower people to fight for their right to live as freely as they feel too. Even if the system failed its citizens, I will not let the system fail me.
Super captivating to see how people are attracted to the Yves Klein Blue, which made me think how each person that passes by and looks at It gets a different feeling from the colour. This fact influenced me in making a small experiment while I was at Tate regarding how people feel about colours and how I feel about people in relation to the 3 main colours we are using.
As a personal interpretation, circular shapes usually mean perfection, calmness and comfort, in a way that I feel complete.
What attracted me to Goldblatt's art was his interest in understanding where he comes from: his surroundings, his people and their gestures, which show an incredible engagement and commitment to his community. something I would like to express in my manifesto as well: how necessary it is for us, as individuals, to know and to empathise with the people that surround us, in order to find out who we truly are.
The American contemporary photographer's work centres around depicting massive crowds of people engaging in a huge, collective performance relating to themselves as a community, but also to their place of belonging. He uses the body and it's chromatics as raw, new materials to "paint landscapes with", which I find super interesting that he looks into people as a whole (as a crowd), but even when you distance yourself and see the photographs from a few steps away, you're still able to identify and distinguish each and every person.
By spray painting in urban spaces, Polain aims to spread a "simple, but yet complex message of and about love in various parts of the world". I feel like the message becomes even stronger, because it not only interacts with people's sight, but it also produces a change in their routine, some sort of a "stop and stare", making them realise how important it is to break it and perhaps think about yourself and others for a minute.
Really interesting to see how the human body takes circular shapes while moving.
"Today, you have 38, 39, 40, 41 reasons to get out of your house (and protest)" says the banner from the Colectiv protest, which recounts again and again the number of people that were losing their lives those days. Personally, the event was a milestone in my life, as it made me take the decision of leaving the country and fighting for a better future somewhere I am treated equally and somewhere where my rights are respected the way they should be. That day, I felt like my country failed me, but I also felt like I was one with the others: we were all together, screaming our frustrations out.
It is also very interesting that he decided to only photograph people's bodies, and not their faces; maybe, as I said later about Clark's art, is more in our body gestures and movements than it is in our spoken works.
Body language is one of the most raw ways of communicating, as it feel more inclusive than anything. Small gestures and body movements seem to be, in a way, for me, the most intense and directly indirect way to communicate. We don't necessarily need words, we just need ourselves.
His art reminds me somehow of protests, but in their most excellent, metaphorical sense of being, because it unites people, it gives them a sense of belonging, it merges them as a whole, but it also gives them the sense of individuality, which I will try to embody in the banner: The idea of being part of a community, but also being able to be just you.
Damien Poulain works in response to actual phenomenons happening around the world, with a certain emphasis of bringing cultures and communities together with the help of shintoist, tribal and heraldic symbols. He uses a wide range of materials such as spray paint, textiles or sculpture in order to create the feeling of a collective manifesto.
Bibliography
- personal pictures
- www.artnet.com
- michaelclarkcompany.com
- www.tate.org.uk
- www.damienpoulain.com
- Tate Modern
- @csm_news Instagram