Liverpool, Installation shots

2008-11-16T12:56:00.000-08:00

Week 4: Liverpool, 10th - 16th Nov

2008-11-14T11:41:00.000-08:00

Naples, Installation shots

2008-11-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

Week 3: Naples, 3rd - 9th Nov

2008-11-07T08:58:00.000-08:00

Istanbul, Installation shots

2008-11-02T11:00:00.000-08:00

Istanbul, Ha Za Vu Zu's performance

2008-11-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

Week 2: Istanbul, 27th Oct - 2nd Nov

2008-10-30T13:00:00.000-07:00

Gdansk, Installation shots

2008-10-26T21:00:00.000-07:00

Gdansk, Leon's performance

2008-10-25T22:00:00.000-07:00

Week 1: Gdansk, 20th - 26th Oct

2008-10-24T23:00:00.000-07:00

October 20th saw the start of the busy first week of Interchange. Roma Piotrowska, the curator from Modelarnia arrived with Michal Andrysiak, photographer and documenter for the first week, early on Monday, and the artist Martyna Zdanowicz arrived later that evening.

The performance artist Krzysztof Dziemaszkiewicz, otherwise known as Leon, could not join us until early on Wednesday morning. But he too arrived safely, despite being given boarding access to the wrong plane at Gdansk airport and narrowly missing flying to London Luton (LTN) instead of Liverpool (LPL). Leon had also checked in a 3 ft long axe with his luggage, our amazement that this had been allowed was matched by curiosity over how it would be employed in his performance.

Initial discussions moved from Tokyou noodle bar to the Philharmonic Pub. Martyna expanded on her interest in paranormal reports that have been made in Liverpool – the city supposedly being located under an inter-stella gateway. Her practice often involves working closely with a certain community or interest group, so she sees this as the beginning of a larger collaborative project that would engage with MARA (Merseyside Anomolies Research Association).

Tuesday morning was the first opportunity the Gdansk group had to view the gallery space as well as explore the immediate vicinity. Everyone commented on the opportunities it offered, and first impressions of Liverpool centered on how calm the atmosphere was - with a stately but more approachable, or manageable, feel to it than experiences of London. But this was before they had seen Friday / Saturday night.

Roma Piotrowska had bought with her a selection of DVD’s containing some brilliant video pieces by a number of Gdansk based artists. Her selection drew on pieces that made reference to some aspect of the ship-yards and port industry of the city, articulating ideas that are highly relevent to the concerns of the Interchange project. One of the first things we did was view these works together on a lap-top in the gallery space.

Roma talked everyone through each piece and we then engagede in a group discussion to decide which pieces should be used, and how they could be displayed. Martyna noticed some connections between her project and the video work Blow-Up by Gregorz Klaman. Roma and Tomas then planned out the exhibition layout. Several larger pieces of work were slightly delayed in their delivery to Liverpool and were expected for early Thursday morning. In the meantime, out time was split between the gallery space, various neighboring cafe's, and explorations into the city.

We were also able to install Gregorz Klaman's large sticker piece I hate this system, but love the opportunities it creates, as this consisted of a large vinyl cut-out that Roma had also bought with her.

The larger pieces from Gdansk arrived at 5:00am on Thursday morning - carefully slotted into the back of a van that also contained garden furniture, gates, prams and other divers and unexpected items. However, the pieces that only pieces that we were interested in were two series of photographs by Michal Szlaga's , Joanna Maltazska & Lukrecja Plusz's Relaxation Sofa, and Jacek Niegoda's Cranes Balet.

Martyna's piece was to occupy a large section of floor space. A section of text quoted on MARA's web-site - taken from an official statement made in response to an alleged UFO incident - was to be reconstructed using letters cut from wood salvaged from the vicinity of the gallery. We spent much of the week working to the music of Martyna's Black & Decker Jigsaw.

This was linked to a constellation that she produced on a nearby wall. The constellation mapped the sky above Liverpool, supposedly the site of an inter-galactic star gate.

Meanwhile, Leon's shopping list became ever more obscure and surprising. 320 Liters of black compost, prayer cards, the Polish Flag (but "blood red"!), a log, bin bags. It was difficult to piece together what he was planning. But his performance on Saturday 25th was to prove that his thought process had been meticulously planned out.

The Saturday completion party was very well attended. A large number of artists from the Royal Standard studio group had scheduled this event into a weekend itinerary for a large number of international artists they had invited to Liverpool for a weekend long NAN networking event. They arrived just in time to see Leon's performance, and then joined everyone else as we moved back upstairs into the gallery space to share drinks.

By the time of the Sunday workshop, we were all pretty exhausted, but the group meeting between the Gdansk and Liverpool artists in Mello Mello was very rewarding - with informal presentations by Jack Southern and Roma Piotrowska. Jack had the interesting perspective of being from England, but having spent considerable amounts of time in Gdansk. He had clearly picked up a lot from his time there.

The workshop was followed by a Polish style dinner for 14 people. Including potato pancakes and Ukrainian Borscht.

What really flavored the Gdanks groups explorations of the Liverpool was the awareness of Duke Streets borderland location between the once neglected rope-walks district, which was the site of one of the cities earlier regeneration efforts, and the new Liverpool One centre at the bottom of the street - a completely unrecognisable insertion into the city. The Dock-lands is also just around the corner and the Georgian quarter at the top of the hill (where the artists were staying).

INTERCHANGE 2008