Summer Academy – course works of the class „Expanded writing: Philosophy and Art“
The course “Expanded Writing: Philosophy & Art” at this year's International Summer Academy of Fine Arts Salzburg offered diverse processes of writing, understood as an exercise in thinking. Maria Persu, Viktoriia Ryzhova, Anna Graf, Evelin Balogh, Vinícius Maffei and Daria Corlațan present their writing pieces.
The question of the limits and possibilities of written articulation draws on philosophical as well as art-theoretical and practical spaces for reflection. The thinking in abstract spheres and explorative writing offers countless perspectives for transforming complex, initially unapproachable, but also emotional or abstract issues into cohesive, consistent, tactful and opening forms of expression.
The following texts are some of the results of the class and engage in various ways with themes of emotional approachability, personal abstraction and social reflections. In the context of this year’s writing class at the Summer Academy, dealing with complex ideas and thoughts is understood as a personal gesture that enters into symbiotic entanglements with perceivable reality.
FLUGHAFEN by Maria Persu
The decoy of Flughafen was the architecture of a Christmas movie. Blue light over mountain tops and Mozart cookies. The trip was coming to an end and I could finally buy Austria.
Flughafen dissolved entire territories and very dutifully so. It made sure that bombs didn’t explode in the wrong geographies.
Flughafen could be Luton in my student years.
December, 2022.
singing christmas carols with the airport employees I admired
you | deeply | for your
ability to contain giggles.
you wanted to stay there longer | silent night | we listened to the staff’s chants:
<< BOTH AIRPORTS AND CHRISTIANITY ARE ABOUT FINDING ONE’S PATH TO THE RIGHT TERMINAL >>
Sorting through the liquids of departing passengers, Flughafen was happy-happy. She would determine the right liquid quantities–30, 50, 100 ml, 200…oops, too much, container, zip lock–almost always accurately, six days a week, 12 to 10 or 10 to 4.
Race, class or gender would govern the triggers of her suspicion.
She would touch mostly female bodies as part of her work, as well as others she could not fully identify. Her touch was gentle as she manoeuvred a dark-coloured metal detector. She would often pretend to be able to tell the difference between coke, dust, sugar, and bomb powder just by a quick sniff.
She would receive her paycheck not-quite-on time and would be flirty and wear red lipstick every day on her lips and on her incisor teeth.
I could tell Flughafen’s national belonging almost instantly. Sometimes, there just is a 1980s Neo-Stalinist air to some people.
Flughafen prayed to an Orthodox God, the one with fake gold on altars and shimmering Easter lights.
Flughafen had exploding burgundy hair, perfectly fixed like Ursula’s in The Little Mermaid. She inhabited the security line.
I addressed Flughafen in English. ‘May I get a second tray, please?’
She simply smiled. I smiled back, happy to return it yet somewhat unsettled.
As a language, Romanian was the unspoken that reigned over our interaction.
Unspoken–maintaining the full privilege of whiteness, a white mask for a white face, unmasked only by language. In Northern Italy, some Romanian waitresses address Romanian customers in Italian only, so as not to cause them embarrassment.
Language, the dutiful cartographer, ordering the work of affect.
The here and now of postsocialism is post-postsocialist. The spectres of postsocialism have joined those of socialism, incapable of fully reproducing their (dis)orderings. So loud that the present barely makes its presence known.
Nothing heroic about Flughafen. Inhabited the security line. Exited the socialist laboratories of modernity. A ghost. The migrant postsocialist worker not so divine. Flughafen embodied security and performed it as the caring hand of the nation-state, taking-care. How violent was the labour of care? A third-party, border care-taker enforcing ‘Austria’. Flughafen with the eyes big behind glasses, longing to become Austria.
Maria Persu
Maria Persu (b. 2000) is a cultural practitioner and researcher from Bucharest.“
Time tastes like a sound by Viktoriia Ryzhova
Fairytales are important for people, I thought once. Certainly, it is hard to find a person who wasn’t amazed with landscapes of paradise, pictures of gingerbread houses and dreams of becoming a queen or a king one day. I dare to think that it would not be an art without humans’ imagination.
What a poor inhabitant! He or she sometimes has to think so much, – sometimes inexcusably many! – times in front of a piece of creation. Is it possible to look at inner life? And in case of being a scientist, our situation becomes really difficult for our heroes? I would like to talk about one of them.
Let’s make an acquaintance, at first. Her name is Zemfira and she prefers being called by a full name. I also know that she has obtained a Master degree in History in Moscow and has temporarily stayed in Berlin, a city – also known as home for Russian emigrants. Finally, she likes travelling and discovering something new, so this person is really good and interesting. So, I hope you will get along, my dear person. And now let Zemfira say.
*
A good time to say!
To begin with, author didn’t mention some changes. Now I am on excursion in Austria and spend two days in Salzburg, a beautiful city for someone who is fond of music and wants to get closer to its history. This second one was my aim too when arriving here. Maybe, we could do it together?
Honestly, when I lived in Moscow, I haven’t even noticed how many historical events surround citizens – these places of celebrations, betrayals, realized and unrealized hopes. But here, when walking around, I could see how much this or another places hide secrets.
Churches, for instance. Their structure and placement is really interesting: staying near one of them opens you a view on another monastery or cathedral. From narrow streets they are often invisible: you have to seek a cross every moment. Thus, I have spent an hour going from one architecture building to other. After getting tired, I sat down on a bench and devoted myself to the most favorite task – thinking about things which would never happen.
But suddenly my mind became astonished. How could it be imagined – symbols of Dante’s and Saint Thomas’ times and I, Zemfira Ramazanova from Moscow, are forward each other! And I am sure that there are many more connections between us but what?..
True: it is the sound of bells. Definitely, they are playing a well-known melody for them during centuries but there is also a moment in every person’s life when he or she listens to this composition of high and squat vocals. Both that one, who is now and these which maybe have been living longer than Abraham in our reality. In a place which united a past and present. By the way, I remembered a joke which was popular among groupmates. They have often said that no one could be judged for being late because time was invented by bourgeoisie! Of course, it was just simple words, but it got linked with the question of time steps – steps of the past which are visible now.
How could I explain this thought? Honestly, one idea that has came in my mind is a small part of my national heritage which I always take with me. It is a poem by Zinaida Gippius, one of my favorite writers. In my opinion, she managed to explain the history in several quatrains – and they became a support for creating a future to thousands of us. The time is fully recovered in these simple words:
The Lord. My Dad.
My birth and my end.
You, Who has a Son and Who’s in Son
With Sone’s Name a prayer’s done…
The God, my Dad, save and help to
Someone I entreat.
Listen to, the God, my praying!
And burn me like this candle now
But grant a spirit’s telling
Your Love and all Your saving
For Someone who is down.
My dear One, maybe one day You will recover from this crisis…
Oh, this sounds. I am sorry, too much has been said. Maybe our life is just a dystopia of reality. But there is a one happy fact: we are breathing and we could make the life of other people a bit brighter. Nowadays, it is a main task for intellectuals of my country.
*
That was then. Let Zemfira to be alone now. She has told us so much, that we need some rest. I, for example, want to eat an ice-cream!
Definitely, let’s promise each other not to forget everyday life and Zemfira’s simple treatment. No one knows what makes us stronger.
Viktoriia Ryzhova
Viktoriia Ryzhova is a student at a European University, even though she was born in the Russian Federation. Her nineteen years of self-understanding enabled her to finish national school, developing a personal interest in literature and finding a beautiful place to live. Now, she is fulfilling a childhood dream to become a person who has created a collage of everything good and meaningful.
Anna Graf
So many ways to communicate
So many words to speak
So many things to say
So many languages to tell something
So many paths to confusion
How can I use words so you understand?
How can I understand your words?
How is together possible and
What is standing between us?
The form? The scientific way?
The discipline? The knowledge?
The perception of the other? The religion?
The thinking?
And aren‘t these unifying us
in the same way they
separate us?
Anna Graf
Anna Graf (b. 1998 in Calw, Germany) is currently studying media culture and art theory at the University of Art and Design Linz. She graduated in Visual Communication in 2023. In her bachelor thesis Exhibition in Print, which was created in cooperation with the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, she dealt with exhibition catalogs, the museum of the future and intervention curation in a permanent exhibition.
schrödinger’s actor by evelin balogh
I live in darkness; womb-like embrace. unseen, I get up to shenanigans. or not, you would not know; I serve you only in observation. I perform for you per forming the surface on which you can project (on)to your heart’s desire.
safe from light, I am protected from fading, bleaching – in an unsavoury way, as I am as pale as the skin of the aborted calf allows, torn from the womb to place me inside – I am fragile, beautiful, shadowless. I am wrapped in shadows. wrapping implying cloth, shadows, in a way, silkiness. neither is true; my shell is hard and precious. backed by a playing card, a secret beneath the secret beneath the secret. you will never know my suit, yet it gives me meaning. oh, the suit of armour I am wearing gives me meaning too. but don’t expect metal. metallic shimmer at best. my protection is ensured by drowning me in jewels; pearls painted with ground silver, neck covered in pure gold. my cheeks use real ruby dust, and sapphire my backdrop. then, quartz. mountain crystal – the eternal ice, pliny the elder proclaimed, although I never knew it to be cold to the touch. a body, somebody, always warms it up – I could be hidden in a bosom right now, as we speak. it’s for my safety, they say, or theirs from me, as I contain toxins. white lead, mostly; venetian ceruse. quartz: a secure, see-through separation, from actor and actant.
my protection is ensured by the stage I perform on; hiddenness upon hiddenness upon hiddenness upon strategic revelation. I contain secrets masquerading as crystal-clear statements. I contain crystal-clear statements masquerading as secrets. I shimmer and shine through; after all, that is my appeal. enchanting through splendour, lustre – preciousness and value carved into my bones, in my bones, in me, defined by someone else.
a garland of rubies, emeralds, diamonds. I am set in enamelled gold, broken down precious pigments heated up in a complex procedure, claiming the shapes they did once hold. a garland of rubies, emeralds, diamonds; this time real and three-dimensional – let us not dwell on where they originally came from. dangling pearls as the tassels of the velvety curtains hiding me from view. there, again. cloth metaphors when all I am surrounded by is glorified rock, metal.
maybe I long for softness, the caress of a gaze – or maybe you are telling yourself that to justify the violation of subjecting me to light, to your voyeuristic tendencies, your touch, your kiss, your schemes. though I am complicit in them regardless; through my birth, my continuous existence.
all I hear is the rustle of fabric as you move, your heartbeat as you carry your secret messenger close to your chest. I am a wandering thing, a travelling troupe of one, performing on the tiniest stage implying the largest stage through every reveal.
my little world is haptic, it crumbles at the slightest touch. I am not real, but I exist – an ideal serving a higher purpose, a caricature of beauty, whiteness, love, violent aspirations. you don’t know what I get up to when unseen, but if you open the locket you’ll find the ballerina ready to spin, notes of your agency the tune I’m dancing to. a twirling agent-patient; who is drawn to who?
evelin balogh
Evelin Balogh (b. 2001) writes and studies in Vienna, investigating themes of agency, transcultural transfer, and approaches in museology at the intersection of art history and anthropology.
Betraying Gestures (synopsis) by Vinícius Maffei
Every morning we get out of bath, we run naked on our tiptoes, in long strides, drip on the carpet, and throw ourselves into bed. We cover our body from the cool breeze coming in from the open window with the duvet, tightly sealing its edges. We tuck the edges under our back, legs, shoulders, and feet. Lying in bed with cold and warmth coexisting sets our words and assembles a text that lasts only for the duration before we muster our hands and arms under the duvet to move to reach the pen and the notebook – an action that disperses the words we ascribe to sets and almost instantly vanishes the text we ascribe to assembles. We cry the cry of a writer whose words capitulate, narrating on our own words capitulating. We tie our hands behind our back. There is no writing with our hands tied behind our back, too, and no fingers with which to wipe away our tears. We work our hands until they slip free from the tie we make from the telephone cord we unplug from the telephone on the nightstand. Still tearing, we look at the handset at the end of the cord from which we just freed our wrists, and we think about how phones work. There is a delay between when a spoken message goes into the microphone and when it comes out through the recipient’s speaker. We cut our cry by paying attention to the delay in the word almost within the phrase almost instantly vanishes, which vanishes the text we want to put down in writing. We devise a plan: fill the bathtub, let it remain full; open the window to its widest; prepare our legs for the strain, stretch our legs; spread the duvet on the bed; fluff the pillow, give it a few taps; write down the text while we have it in assemblage, letter-by-letter, in its sparse duration, before the pen we hold and the paper we jot on registers what we do and our words give in. We make seventeen trips from the tub to the bed and back. By the seventeenth, the carpet exhibits wet spots from the tip of our toes running, the duvet and the pillow are soaked, the pen is slippery, the notebook, stained blue from the slippery pen’s ink, the skin on our extremities is wrinkling, and we have two words down in writing. We write betraying gestures, for our own eyes, which we see through the bathroom mirror and through the mirror we unhook from the inside of the wardrobe door, lifting the heavy wooden frame by grabbing it from both its sides and directing it to the bed, leaning the mirror against a wooden chair.
Vinícius Maffei
Vinícius Maffei (São Paulo, 1996) is a writer and visual artist based in Copenhagen. Vinícius’ practice transpires around Betraying Gestures, a publishing affair shifting between publisher, novel, and writer.
Shit is a sign for co-habitation. by Daria Corlațan
Picture a time a thousand years from now, when human civilization has started to crumble, and all that has remained are scattered relics of our culture. In this distant time, a traveler might stumble upon the remnants of our lore and, from these pieces, reconstruct the legend of a creature so revered, that someone would think it was the pinnacle of existence. This noble and grand being roamed the earth with unmatched grace.
It is likely the most prevalent creature in the entire history of art. From prehistoric times, through Greek and especially Roman art, to the Renaissance and Romanticism, it graces every era. This creature was a great aid in war, without whose strength, no man would have dared to face the trials of a battle. Its power shaped our very image. This creature was appointed by the Divine and guided by Moses to aid us in cultivating our food. A being entwined with all wealth, it mesmerized men with its speed, causing them to wager their fortunes upon it.
Shall I proceed? If an anthropologist of the future were to see our remains, he would think that this creature is the most revered of all living creatures, a companion in war and labor. We like it very much. It’s expensive to be sure, but a thing so powerful doesn’t cost a fortune? Clearly, I think you can imagine the features of this fantastic animal. Elegant, sleek, lustrous, seductive, powerful, fast, strong, more like a Ferrari, with lots and lots of horsepower.
During the weeks when I was in Salzburg, I have seen this creature every day. But it wasn’t as I imagined it or as The Story of Art shows it to me through its glossy pages. It was so different. Where lies the grandeur, where dwells the appreciation, and where resides its power? All I saw was a taxi, a taxi with four legs and four wheels. It turned out that everything that I had learned about and believed this creature to be was a lie. From everything I thought and everything I saw, I thought I was supposed to bow down to it, not the other way around.
Donna said ‘make with’. We made with .., wars, fortunes, houses, cites. Yet for us, it remains merely an object—an artifact that any esteemed European city with a rich history would proudly display in its historic center as a cultural tradition, for the hordes of American tourists, who would not turn a blind eye to its existence.
But let me go back to the beginning. You might be thinking, why did I said what I said in the first place? I’ll explain why.
The first day in the city of Salzburg I smelled such a strong scent, especially towards home, that it reminded me of my grandparents and the village where they live, the smell of muck. The smell of excrement makes me think of a living being eating, sleeping, getting tired, something as human as possible. That odor, because I knew exactly what it was, made me think that those creatures live with us, are among us. Until then, they seemed to be objects, but with that smell, I became aware of their existence.
My grandparents had such a creature. They didn’t glorify it but rather cursed it. When the creature died, they cried, especially my grandfather, who dedicated his entire life to work—not just out of necessity, but because he enjoyed it. He worked at the furniture factory by day, and at the farm in the afternoons, and played at weddings on weekends. Now less so after his battle with cancer, but he was once a true workaholic in every sense of the word. When the creature, beside with who he worked the land, died, he cried. He cried not out of deep affection for the animal, but because its death symbolized the end of his ability to work. It signified the loss of his sense of purpose, leaving him to face the last years of his life without direction or meaning.
Daria Corlațan
Daria Corlațan (b. 1999, RO) is an emerging cultural professional who holds a master’s degree in curatorial studies, completed with a research focus on the recontextualization of archival documents within artistic practice. Her interests lie in the realms of post-photographic images, the intersection of cultural memory and art, and in the expanded fields of curating.
The course “Expanded Writing: Philosophy & Art” was taught by Fahim Amir and co-taught with Lisa Moravec.
Das könnte dich ebenfalls interessieren
Galerie Sophia Vonier – ein neuer Standort zwischen Privatem und Öffentlichem
