Celebration time

... with family and friends.

Silk & water

How beautiful and enigmatic is this still photograph by Carolyn Quatermaine... I have been following this UK based installation artist since the mid-90's and have always found her euphermal composition of fabrics and natural elements, seductive and inspiring.

Romantic eyes

Floral romance

Young Aussie Beauty

The commercial, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EfLaodWJnk&feature=player_embedded titled the Cathy Spirit ad, sees a young girl, my girlfriend's daughter Talissa Picone race across an open field, with the voice of commentator Bruce McAvaney from Freeman’s famous victory at the Sydney 2000 Olympics in the background.

We are all flesh

Berlinde de Bruyckere

"We are all flesh"

Australian Centre of Contemporary Art

June-July 2012

Life is good.

I'm so happy to be home and feel so enriched by the amazing opportunities and experiences I've been exposed to.

I am aware that my experiences abroad are 'a world away' from today's sunshine glistening off the water across the Bay, and I feel privileged to be able to live between these two vastly different and wonderful realities.
x

Home "Sweet Home"

Returned from my Euroepan sojourn Sunday morning and was greeted at the Airport with the warm and instant embrace of my Mum..

Ahh... there is nothing more reassuring, cherished and beautiful in this world than a loving embrace.

Home sweet home again in Melbourne and it feels good.

Homeward bound...

I come from a "Land down under" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbsfupH8W1o&feature=related .. and tomorrow after six incredibly inspiring and surreal weeks in Europe I'm heading home to Melbourne.

I'm so thrilled to have had this time in Europe, pursuing my passions and dreams. It's been wonderful! Now I'm looking forward to embracing and catching-up with family and friends, curling up in my bed, sleeping till noon, day dreaming and distilling all that I've seen and experienced, the horizon across the Bay, my cafe at the end of the street and uncharted dreams.

Day Four: dOCUMENTA(13)

Melbourne

During my stay in Europe, occasionally I have thought about Melbourne and what 'uncharted dreams' lie ahead. I'm happy to be going home and once I've rested, re established a work-life-home balance and got back into the rhythm of my life, I'm looking forward to seeing how these experiences transform me and ... 

   New love.

   Buying an apartment by the Bay and make a beautiful home.

   Complete motorbike licence and buy a Vespa.

   Purchasing a Bang & Olsen stereo so that I can listen to international 
   radio stations.
   More adventure travel, possibly the Trans Siberian Rail from Beijing to St 
   Petersburg and then up to  
   Norway, trek the French-Italian Alps, Sydney Biennale, Israel for 
   Christmas, a remote island get away or coastal retreat. 

What are you dreaming about...?

Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev

'The riddle of art is that we do not know what it is until it is no longer, that which it was. Furthermore, art is denied as much by what it is. as by what it is not; by that it does, or can do, as by what it does not, or cannot do; it is defined even by what it fails to achieve."

dOCUMENTA(13) is dedicated to artistic research and forms of imagination that explore commitment, matter, things, embodiment and active living in connection with yet not subordinated theory.

Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev
Curator dOCUMENTA(13)

Day Three: dOCUMENTA(13)

Highlights:

Ryan Gander

Zanele Muholi

Ceal Floyer 'Til I get it tight' (2012)

Sanja Ivekovic

Additional highlights: Sense and Nonsense dTOUR: Into the Secrets of dOCUMENTA(13). An insider dTOUR with participating artists.

Exploration of the exhibition through a direct encounter with participating artists. Thematic focuses can include misunderstandings of the value systems and hidden costs in cultural production, or an inquiry into the fact that the contemporary art world today is divided between an extreme focus not he market, and a discursivity involving critical theory or political activism as art. Another theme is non-anthropocentric forms of knowledge, love, politics and skepticism.

Day Two: dOCUMENTA(13)

Day Two: Exploring dOCUMENTA(13) artworks at Hauptbanhof Train Station and surrounds.

Highlights: Janet Cardiff and George Burres Miller - Video and sound scape. Just amazing. Very clever piece and at times it was also very emotional. Particularly the scene where a German man gives a brief account of his memories of the WWII bombing, the destruction of lives and the train that departed from Kassel to one of the Concentration Camps from Platform number 13. The contemporary dance sequence at the end, was pure poetry. Exquisite. 

Image of a permanent installation at Hauptbanhof. A wheel barrel filled with steel boxes that hold rocks covered in paper with notes from the Jewish children of Kassel. The children wrote letters and drew images, before being sent to the Concentration Camps.

Susan Phillipsz - Another beautiful sound scape experience in the middle of the train station. Well worth the wait.

Clemens von Wedemeyer - Sometimes I follow a video without complete awareness of its meaning. The trilogy of videos from this series were engaging but I couldn't comprehend the connection, part from the actors who appeared in different roles and different timeframes. It wasn't until I read about the artwork that I understood that the three videos depict across three large video screens a narrative about a premise in Kassel, during three different eras in history (1945, 1970's, 1990's). The premise is a Catholic Church and Monastery, that was then converted into a Prison, a WWII Concentration Camp, and an Asylum for Young women. It is now an open-centre for Pyschiatric patients.  

Tino Sehgal at Huggenottenhaus. As incredible as what I'd been told. One of the d(13) "must see".

Additional highlights: Meeting Auckland artist Judith Rosamund and her friend recently retired Art teacher from Kassel.

On a lighter note...

William Kentridge

dOCUMENTA(13)

I can't believe it. I'm actually in Kassel, Germany attending the dOCUMENTA(13). What an experience. What a setting. Love it. Just LOVE it....

It's midnight and I've just arrived home after a full day exploring the contemporary artworks in Karlause (the gardens of Kassel), one of the venues for the dOCUMENTA(13). From what I've seen today, you need nearly a week here to truly absorb and engage with these works.

Highlight: Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller. Sound installation within the forest. Seated under a canopy of trees listening to an orchestra of mixed sound and thematic music. Mesmerising. Immersive. Captivating. 

Additional (unexpected highlights): Attended an art evolution piece "Sanatorium" and participated in two projects. Through this experience I met a Journalist from Cologne who follows contemporary art for passion. He said that he finds art helps him balance his professional work (commentary on science, world events and politics). A nice man. Well versed on contemporary art and art events. We walked and talked together for a while as we traversed the gardens, and then after making arrangements to have dinner together, parted to see separate works. Sadly we didn't sync our meeting point very well and didn't end up reuniting.

By this stage, it was getting dark, I was a little cold and ready for dinner, so I was walking towards Kassel centre to call a taxi to head back to the hotel, when  I saw a quaint German style restaurant and entered.

Whilst eating my delicious meal accompanied by a local light brew, I was happily reviewing my notes and photographs from the day, and then a man who was seated behind me and I started talking. In Kassel this is easy to do, especially with the distinguishable copy of dOCUMENTA(13) on your dinner table. Dr Joshua Jiang is an Art Curator from London and is curating the Fourth Guanzhou Triennial in China this year. Hence our evening lingered over discussions on art etc etc...

Day One: dOCUMENTA(13)

Fiona Hall, Sydney AUSTRALIA 

Jules at dOCUEMNTA(13), Kassel Germany.

Paris to Kassel

Traveling around northern Europe to pursue contemporary art. Pure bliss...now this is living.

Dancing

Dancing, a recurring theme during my time in Europe.

...when Marco and I went out to together in Rovereto, he asked me whether I wanted to go dancing... at Claudia and Lorenzo's wedding, shortly after the open air quintet started playing, Marco took hold of my hand and led me to the courtyard to dance with him... Roberto asked me to dance with him at Dialogo al Buio... yesterday I saw the video from Egypt called 'Jewel' with the two men dancing in the street around a suspended stereo (video below)...  this afternoon I saw couples dancing in the courtyard adjacent to Palais de Tokyo.

Makes me ponder... image if our lives danced upon this joyous, romantic and lovely theme.

Impressions of Paris

A leisurely start to the day with breakfast in bed, then attended Mass at Notre Dame, Lunch at Saint Germaine, Le Puce for the Antique Markets, walked along the Seine and the Champse Elysee, dinner at Palais de Tokyo, Completed touring the contemporary exhibitions until it closed at midnight, then took the subway to go home, started packing for tomorrow's departure to Cassel, transferred and up loaded some photographs and videos from today....Sometimes I live a life time in one day. It's 2am, Paris is asleep and so should I be. 

A great Sunday. 

Buon nuit.

Jules in Paris

Jules outside Notre Dame, Paris.

Hey check out the 'lions mane'... it's the water, it makes my hair go wild and I can't do anything with it. No matter how many products I buy or use. The only time it behaved was when I had it styled in Milan prior to the wedding.

Then every time Marco suggested we go swimming I nearly died. If only he knew how much trouble these locks create and how much time I had to spend in the 'salon' to have them deep treated, cropped, and tamed!

Sunday morning...

Tokyo Eat, Paris

Words of hope

Hi Julie-Ann,


It's great to hear from you.

Funny since I'm leaving for Paris in a couple of hours! :-)

Endings are never easy. I had to close all the doors to our future as well as to many mutual friends when I ended my relationship with my husband. It was painful for me, but once I finally did that, many, many new doors opened up. New people and friends came into my life and I feel as if I am once again alive. I do hope that you too can grieve your losses to embrace what wonderful things life has in store for you.

Have a great weekend!

Take care,

Melinda

Art

Vitrines sur l'Art

Bastille Day

As the fireworks from the Eiffle Tower light up the crisp air and night sky with colour, excitement, mist and noise to commemorate Bastille Day, I'm cosy inside my Parisian abode, sipping my coffee and sifting through thoughts.

Occasionally, during the 45 minute display I leaned out of my balcony, gazed up and over the art nouveau buildings etched in wrought iron and down the cobblestoned lane, but I didn't feel tempted to go outside and join the spectacle. My senses and soul are content and satisfied; and this feeling reminded me of New Years Eve at Rosebud, when we were content sitting indoors watching the Sex and the City Movie II, as the fireworks blazed and outdoors on the foreshore.

Chantal Akerman

D'Est (1993) is the first film in a trilogy exploring margins, the area between borders and the Others. This film focuses on routine details shortly after the fall of the iron Curtain. On 16m film Chantel Akerman films in real time 'the wreck of the world in movement: the waiting lines, the passing cars and buses, intimates meals between men and women, more or less young, seated or standing'. Not a word is spoken, but the camera flows and pauses on several anonymous characters.

Joost Conijn

Joost Conijn's video transports the viewer for 45 miniutes into the lives of seven Dutch children aged between 3 to 14 years who are begin raised in Islamic tradition and living on the outskirts of Amsterdam on the edge of a squatters camp. They live completely autonomously and without any parental supervision. At one point in the video one of the young girls on viewing a cartoon magazine states "Why are they crying?" and another latter asks "What does 'be careful' mean?"

Amsterdam 2004

Fear

This video documents interviews between Americans and Mexicans and discusses how the government and the media coerce the public into certain assumptions and create fear and vulnerability throughout he portrayal of violence, abuse, and illegal acts and xenophobia. 

Memories of Ntifa

Memories of Ntifa, Morocco.

Room with a View

27 Rue de Beauregard, Paris

View from my Parisien abode.

Marin the owner of this apartment sent me an email today and in it he wrote... "I'm happy you have Nice time at home.. I specially love my apartment when it's grey and raining outside... Like a bubble in Paris :)"

Jewel

Men dancing in the streets of Egypt.

Parigi

I can't thing of a more beautiful place to indulge myself in pure escapism, than...

one of the most beautiful and timeless cities in the world.

Memories make me realise the length and breath of my experiences, the rich life I have lived and the person I have become (am becoming)...

As I traveled, I gazed out of the train window as it glided past through the Swiss Alps this afternoon and just before I entered my charming Parisian abode in Rue Beauregard in Ile de France, I started thinking...

In 2007, I traveled to Florence to pursue my life long dream 'to live and love' like an Italian. It was an enriching and inspiring time and even after I returned to Melbourne, I continued to nurture, believe and invest in these dreams. Over the last six years I have been true to myself, and pursued my heart and dreams. When I left Milan/Italy this morning I felt nostalgic, but satiated.

Outside twilight has began to descend upon a gloomy sky and it's raining lightly. Inside, the apartment is illuminated with soft candles and amber light. I can hear the sound of some cars across the street scape. I feel the stillness in the air. My hair is still a little damp from the rain, my white linen dress possibly soiled and my french conversation skills I fear need more than just dusting off. Despite all of this I feel safe, calm and content. 

It's been a BIG six months and the last 5 weeks has been all about agenda's, engaging conversations and analysing art and cultural events. Amazing, beautiful and precious, but now that it is over, I'm happy to just be guided by my senses, and go wherever inspiration takes me. I am looking forward to being in Europe (Paris and Cassel), as a 'tourist' and at the end of my 'hol-i-day' (as Jamilla always so joy-fully proclaims), with the knowledge and understanding of my experiences in Italy, I will be looking forward to returning to Melbourne and planting my feet on terra-firma. To breathe in the sea air, and gaze out at the horizon across Port Phillip Bay. To see what comes of all of this, and to welcome new beginnings and uncharted dreams.

Contemplation

As I have been traveling past the Swiss Alps on the train journey from Milan to Paris, I've been reflecting on my time in Italy and given that it will be some time before I can begin to fully process all the engaging conversations and diverse opportunities I have experienced; it is nice to have this time to be silent and still. To gaze out the window and just be.

Uncharted dreams

Francesca

It is true, 'one person can impact upon your life and influence it's course or destiny'.

Francesca & Jules at Pirelli Fondazione HangarBicocca, Milano with Fausto Melotti's La Sequenza in the background

Francesca was the first Curator in Milan to accept my proposal to undertake an Internship for the University of Melbourne Scholarship in Milan. I remember ringing her after a long and exhausted day. It was 1am in Melbourne and despite my fatigue and nerves, I tried to speak eloquently in Italian. Her response was instantly warm and supportive and enabled all my plans to come to fruition. Throughout my stay in Milan Francesca continued to be accessible, gracious and supportive and I hope that our paths will one day cross again.

Forty days of gelati

Dear Suz,

As a loving and self-less gesture, I have eaten three selections of home made Italian gelati each and every day since I arrived in Milan.

I hope I have made you proud.

And I hope you enjoy tubby-Jules, when next we embrace.

Love you

x

Last day in Milan

Its nearly 2am and as expected, after spending the evening with my Milanese friend Cristina in Navigli, I'm on the computer typing up some notes, preparing for tomorrow and finalising a parcel to ship home to Australia.

When the alarm sounds tomorrow morning, it will mark the beginning of my last 24 hours in Milan. Can you believe it? It's going to be a busy day, as I will be travelling around Milan to conclude established relations with the Art Curators and Directors of Museo del Novecento, Museo Leonardo da Vinci and Fondazione HangarBicocca. Given I'm not good with farewells, I hope that I don't get too emotional. My experiences at these art institutions has been honestly captivating and in many ways exceeded my expectations. I'm sad to be leaving because they have been so supportive and welcoming, and it has been such a thrill to walk through their doors at any time day or night - as though they were my second home. 

In particular I'll miss Museo del Novecento. I still remember doing YogaArte with Marina in Sala Fontana under Luca Fontana's spectacular neon light installation and the backdrop of Il Duomo. I have become very found of the museo's architecture, it's position, art collection, archival area, activities and the people that work at the museo. 

And as I gather my notes and belongings from my well positioned apartment in Brera, I gather thoughts about my time and experiences in Milan and Italy. It has definitely been a full, highly active, productive and stimulating time. And a time of new realisations and new perspectives.

Returning to Milano after Trento - to a new location, home environment and being on my own - was challenging and for that first day painful. I now feel as though being on my own to face my loneliness, doubts and fears, was how it was meant to be. I thank my Mum and friends in Florence and Melbourne who sent their love and support via emails and phone calls, it cradled me against heavy storms, but having to live that night and the next day essentially on my own, gave me the space and time to think and in the end, forced me to move on, to keep going and to refocus on what I was here to do. I'm glad that the mind numbing sadness and feeling of loss, past within a few days and I'm pleased in some ways to leave this story in Italy where it was born and nurtured.

As Maurio said the other night 'Great that means new love can begin'. I smiled because I understood what he mean't.

Who knows where and what lies ahead for you or for me? But it is not about knowing is it. Rather it is about believing in ourselves and making our way through our lives with courage, faith and balance.  

Antonella Anedda

There's a window in the night
with two dark shapes asleep
dun as birds
whose bodies draw back against the sky.

I write with patience
to the eternity I don't believe in.
Slowness comes to me from silence
and from a freedom - invisible -
which the mainland's unaware of
the islands of a thought which spurs me
to rein in time
to give it space
inventing the desert for that language.

The word splits like wood
like a piece of wood cracked on one side
part the effect of fire
part of neglect.

from 'Sistemi Emotivi - artisti contemporanei tra emozione e ragione'.

Palazzo Strozzina, Firenze

Villa Panza, Varese

Went to Villa Panza in Varese to view Bill Viola's video installations. Inspirational and hauntingly beautiful as always. The first time I saw 'Ocean without a Shore' (2007), I was instantly captivated by the Caravaggio-esque images. The seven videos on display were no exception, especially 'Three Women' (2008) and one of his earlier works 'Nantes Triptych' (1992). 

Cuocolo & Bosetti

I joined a group of Milanese theatre goers tonight for an apertivo at ex Ospedale Psichiatrico Paolo Pini before car pooling and driving to Vercelli to attend 'Roberta torna a casa'. An intimate and immersive performance by Cuocolo & Bosetti in their home.

I missed their performance when they attended the Melbourne Arts Festival and few years ago and was thrilled to finally have the chance to experience their contemporary and engaging work. It was marvellous, the dialogue captivating and one scene in a room of their home, spell bounding. The images and words are etched in my memory. Just beautiful.

At the end of the night, the delightful couple Maurio and Angela who I had traveled with, drove me home. Cradled in the back of their car, with jazz music softly playing and their distant chatter I fell asleep. It had the nostalgia of my childhood and driving home to Melbourne from Geelong with Mum, Dad and Bruno. Looking back, unexpectedly this feeling is what I needed to 'return home'.

Noise

Silence is a desire, a dream, an aspiration, something so unknown and so inaccessible that we can only imagine it.
Often, we speak of silence, a silent house, the quiet and silence of the landscape, the silence of a hospital or a temple, the silence of night, etc.
But, in  none of these cases is the silence real. Our silence is noise.
Noise as the only bridge between sound and silence, between what we know and what we wish.
As soon as all is quiet and becomes mute, when we think we have achieved silence, we discover that something interrupts, something as close and familiar as our own body. Our noisy body.
For Blake, a thought fills immensity. Maybe a thought is nothing more than one more of our body's noises and our body one more of life's nosies.
I invite you to listen to these noises
I invite you to image silence.

Fragmented thoughts

My mind is numb, and my soul limp, so I search for enrichment, diversion hope in the words and thoughts of others.

From In the woods there were chainsaws.

'Memory is a dog, which lies down wherever it likes'. - Cees Nooteboom

'My memory has given me a sentence, which is different and perhaps even better than the original. I do not know if that is good or bad. What I do know now is where my incorrigible optimism stems from and my related refusal to accept cynicism as a proper attitude to life: they originate in a malfunctioning of my brain that preserves certain things better and more beautiful then they were, while the rest drains away through a coarse-mesh sieve.' - Berlinde de Bruyckere

'If our thoughts and actions are but splinters of glass, broken by others, then walking in ice was a fragmentation bomb that put into words the feelings and these sculptures into being'. - Berlinde de Bruyckere

It is as if, her sculptures express my pain and emptiness. 

Berlinde de Bruyckere

Wax sculptures of German contemporary artist Berlinde de Bruyckere, are emotive representations of the human form. Glimpses of antinomy emerge from organic images, the body yields to the inner emotions of pain and suffering and appears as though it is physically decomposing.

They render me speechless.

"A falling forward become a Walk"