Archive for category: Blog

During the whole Corona lockdown time KHMessen has had the pleasure to enjoy the stay of three guests that had to expand their stay to three months. All three artists have enjoyed their time at Messen during the lockdown. It felt like a safe place to be and within the restriction they still had the freedom to cycle, swim and take walks in the surrounding, next to their intensive studio work.

One of the three, Marion Blume left Messen a week ago and now Olivia and Greg are at the end of their stay. So yesterday we held our monthly open studio with a selective group of visitors.

Olivia Brelsford-Massey (UK) showed her process by presenting a short video with animation inspired by foundings in and around the house and the magic of the fjords. And by showing small drawings of thoughts and playful assets for her video and objects in her studio.

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Gregory Gan (Russia nd Canada) read an short story to us in his studio about the existence of his watercolors and how they are tangled with his life. We listened to his story surrounded by his beautiful watercolors and video works.

I came to KHMessen to investigate dwelling places as social entities. I was born in Moscow, in the former Soviet Union, and when I was still a child, my family migrated to France, and then Canada. From my earliest memories, well into my adult life, and across several countries, I lived in high-rise apartments. In my artwork, I wanted to capture the ambiguity of feeling at once intimately connected, and anonymous amongst one’s neighbours.

I decided to recreate every house in which I lived using watercolour paintings. I would create a collection culminating in a painting of my latest “residence”: KHMessen. Besides the watercolours, I wanted to make a multimedia collage based on the outlines of these homes—a kind of Frankenhome—which would then be laid onto a large canvas to create a cyanotype, an architectural blueprint. This blueprint would be combined with video projections, soundscapes, watercolour sketches, and relief prints. The theoretical concept for which I sought a visual metaphor was an image schema, a visual, linguistic, embodied, and historical pattern the mind conjures to give us an understanding of the world, and arguably, forms the basis for our identity. My proposal aimed to visualize how each person’s unique history is intimately connected to their experience of lived places, and to other human beings. 

Shortly after I arrived to KHMessen, the first cases of COVID-19 virus began to emerge in Norway. As the situation intensified over the next several weeks, the Norwegian government enacted ever-stricter measures to control the pandemic. The situation brought into stark contrast my privilege of living in a remote village—I was able self-distance by going on hikes in the mountains, or bike rides along the fjord—and the lockdowns my friends and relatives faced across urban centres around the world. Around this time, I was painting my former home in Toronto—a twenty-two storey apartment block where I briefly lived with my mother and grandmother some years ago. As my paintbrush gave shape to the neat rows of apartment cubicles, I began to fret about how my mother and grandmother would need to negotiate interactions with their neighbours: every door handle, every pressed elevator button now represented a possible vector of transmission. I began making frantic phone calls organizing food deliveries, checking up on elderly relatives, and trying to convince them to stay home. 

The state of emergency catalyzed my thoughts about what I found truly important: paradoxically, as ever-stricter social distancing measures came into effect, I felt ever-closer to people across ever-widening physical distances. As we experienced isolation, fear, anxiety, or boredom each in our particular ways, friends, colleagues, and family began finding new ways of connecting on social media. At that moment, having painted thirteen out of a planned thirty former domiciles, and having drafted video projections onto a blank canvas, I placed the project I tentatively titled Closer to Home on hold. Besides, I reasoned that watercolours would make an ideal pastime for the two-week self-quarantine I would have to undergo at my next destination, wherever that may be. As booked flights, festivals, conferences, and teaching engagements were predictably cancelled, or rerouted online, I found myself much more amenable to small changes, finding that I needed to muster my resources to prepare for the big ones.

I am now working to establish connections with other artists who find themselves in similarly precarious situations. Amongst colleagues working in art, film, and anthropology, we launched an Artist Support Network (fragilematters.wordpress.com), which aims to provide support to artists adapting their modes of creative production to changing circumstances. We began hosting online gatherings, where we discuss how to respond to the crisis most effectively as artists, and as community members. Using an online platform, we are also pooling together resource for artists, filmmakers, and educators, who are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

My work has also taken on a much more personal quality. I started recording video letters, largely unedited and improvised, which I began sending out to relatives and friends. I bring my friends along on hikes, bike rides, or on daily routines. The rawness and immediacy of these tele-messages feels authentic. It is, perhaps, a way that I intimately connect the experience of a lived place to other human beings.

Gregory Gan  (Ålvik 03.04.2020)

Deadline: 30 April 2020

Call for entries

Residency KHMessen in Norway

Applications are now open for a working period in 2021 at KHMessen in Norway!

The Residency Program provides space and time for artists. We welcome visual artists, writers, composer/musicians, performance artists at any stage of their careers who are interested in exploring and expanding their work in a unique and supportive environment. KHMessen consists of artistically crafted and unique living and studio spaces. Time spans are individually based – 1 to 3 months, accommodating 4 to 6 artists at a time.

KHMessen is situated in the small town Ålvik surrounded by mountains and very close to the fjord.
KHMessen AiR program is particularly beneficial to those who find it restorative to live in a community environment surrounded by the natural beauty of the mountains and fjords.

The spaces are versatile, providing residents with opportunities to connect and interact with other artists in the house and with the Ålvik community. Also to create and participate with the monthly Open studio and artist talks or house concerts.

Please note: Residency periods are for full calendar month(s) and we ask a fee of 1000 Norwegian Krone per month.

Application period is from 1th March until 31 May 2021

You can find our online application form on our website under: How to apply

https://www.khmessen.no/

Cosy times during the open studio event.

Work at the fjord by Ingrid Pasmans (2019).

Admiring the delicate drawings of Zane Tuča.(2018)

Performance on the top of the mountain by Anastasia Savinova (2019).

Work of Sam van Strien (2017).

Preparing the filmset of Tatiana Blass (2014)

Performance of Linda Molenaar (2014).

We like to invite to the first Open Studio of 2020 at KHMessen.
The artists that have a working period at our residency are:

Natalia Mikhalchuk, illustrator from Russia
Jaya Stenquist, writer from USA
Sandra Blichert, visual artist from Danmark living in Norway

During the evening our writer-in-residence Jaya is giving a short writing workshop for the visitors!