As I have already participated as an off-site resident on The Cambridge Sustainability Residence in 2015 and there were so many inspiring arguments discussed online that have opened so much space for reflection and research and so many ideas for artistic intervention and that although it was a very prolific collaboration for all the artists who participated on the residency there are so many questions that remained open for further research and artistic interpretation. So I have decided to apply again for the residency in order to try to complete the started in 2015 artistic research and collaboration.
For the Cambridge Sustainability Residence 2015 as the theme was “Raw” I had planed to work on the phenomenon of sprouting (as I have had recently switched on a raw food diet and sprouting seeds had become my main “cooking mode” but also the only possibility I had for gardening (some kind of “micro gardening”) which I was very interested in, but unfortunately didn’t have the “space” for. At the beginning as a starting idea I was very fascinated by the vitality and the aliveness that a so small seed has and all the transformations of sprouting and growing which first I named “Green Metamorphosis” but further during the residency influenced by the discussions online about “nomadic”in art and all the inspiring thoughts and ideas about sustainability of the other artists who participated on the residency, this idea evolved in the work “Nomadic Garden”.
As for the CSR 2016 the selected themes are insulation and growth I plan to continue to work on the natural phenomenon of “sprouting” (sprouting is the very beginning of the process of “growth”) and need the shelter and the “insulation” of the ground (or an other warm and dark alternative of ground as in sprouting seeds at home for “raw cooking”), so I plan to work on these key ideas: warm, dark, ground, womb and grave as an insulation and the vital and biological transformations of growing, the natural materials used in gardening or house building for sustainable insulation to reduce the energy waste and the natural material for insulation that I plan to investigate most is the paper (the paper seen as a “dead tree”), which is another argument I am focusing in my recent painting production on: the tree also as materials provider, paper is made of wood, so certain dead trees become paper which forwards becomes a support for registered knowledge of all kind: from news and advertising to art and literature. In my recent paintings I have been “recycling” advertising brochures and newspapers and transform them in material structure for my paintings, some kind of a secondary metamorphosis of the paper (the tree). My choice of recycling paper to paint a forest is a sustainability concept: not to destroy the real and living forest for painting the metaphorical one. It could be seen also like a further “reincarnation” of the forest turning back the cycle in an alternative way; the real tree becomes paper which becomes a newspaper which becomes again a tree – an image of a tree, unfortunately it is not a physical but only a metaphorical rebirth. For CSR 2016 I plan to go a little bit further, not only to paint a forest using recycled paper as in my recent paintings which is too symbolic (like painting itself) but to explore the use of paper (only a re-used recycled and sustainable paper) in the gardening for insulation and “growth” and potential rebirth of the “dead tree”/ paper and use these knowledge to create an installation where the paper becomes really “alive” again, trying to sprout seeds in re- used paper as a support for growth: the paper (an organic but dead fiber of wood) as a ground and womb for the seed. I am not sure if it could work, recently I have read articles about newspapers of recycled paper with non toxic organic inks which were produced with plant seeds incorporated in, that after being read can be posed on the ground and after watering they grow and transform in a garden, which really impression my mind: an old newspaper transforms into green living garden!!! Probably during the residency all these working ideas under the influence of the discussions, reflections and thoughts by the other artists would evolve in something very different that now I do not have even a mere idea for, and I think this is exactly the purpose of collecting artists exchanging opinions and experiences and creating something together that probably could never achieve working alone
Leaf project, Cambridge Sustainability Residence 2016
Art project of International artists,
writers, curators and designers
focussing on environmental and
social sustainabily.
