Death of Mr. Perfect comes as no surprise

The snow arrived unexpectedly early this year in Sweden. Apparently it also did in Canada. In the morning I had the opportunity to make my own Mr. Perfect, but unfortunately he didn't last long. By mid afternoon the next day all traces of him had vanished. And back in Copenhagen nobody had ever even heard about him.

Questions & Answers

I recently went to London's East End to see the show Questions and Answers by Marcus Coates at Kate MacGarry.
Marcus Coates is renowned for his often hilarious performances where he is wearing animal skins and appears to go into shamanic trances in an attempt to get answers to questions raised by the audience.
Trying to address everyday questions as well as major political problems this way is a refreshing new (old) approach - and isn't it THERE in the gap between subject and object, matter and spirit, nature and culture etc. that we find THAT?
But is it possible to look through other specs than those we have been wearing for 300 years in the Carthesian worldview with it's neatly hierarchically ordered and distinct dualisms?
Rane Willerslev is addressing the Cartesian legacy in anthropology in the book Soul Hunters: Hunting, Animism, and Personhood among the Siberian Yukaghirs where he challenges the Western anthropolgical view that tends to see shamanism and animism as "a particular cultural construct, intensely intriguing and interesting perhaps, but without any foundation in reality".
Marcus Coates uses mimicry in his practice i.e. he imitates but without loosing his own identity (he only dresses partly as an animal). But is he an artist acting like he is a shaman, or is he seriously trying to be a shaman? Well, leaving Descartes behind, the question is meaningless. To me he is entering the realm where he is not an artist (or shaman) and yet he is also not not an artist (or shaman).
In conclusion I would like to confess: I am not a tree, but I am also not not a tree.

Going home

I have embarked on a new project this summer. I am making my own Hermitage, House of WildWoodWoman, Recluse Refuge, Museum of Natural Histories or Thoreau Tabernacle. You name it!

I am inspired by Anne la Bastille and Henry Thoreau but contrary to their cabins, mine is mobile. I want to be free to explore Wilderness - the inner as well as the outer. Wish me luck!......

Coming soon to a forest near you.

But first I am heading westward to become a pioneer settler. 

What's hiding behind the Bush?

What's hiding behind the Bush? Have you had it checked recently?
I checked it out at Brandts at the exhibition Wild Things.
Gerda Steiner and Jörg Lenzlinger made these hilarious bushes to wear and to roll.
Now I know what to hide behind when I am 87 :-)

Name That Thing!

"The practice of putting people into boxes and labeling things keeps us from knowing one another and the world as such. In fact that habit separates sister from brother. And totally dissolves the connection allowing us to know we are ONE."
I stumbled upon this statement from "the world wide self development department".

It might be true in some aspects, but when it comes to survival in the world wide wilderness - especially when foraging for wild mushrooms it is crucial to be able to label things:

 friend or foe.  

Unnaturalized Citizens?

Krka National Park, Croatia

Is this Forests in a Full World ?

Or unnaturalized Citizens of the Forests?

Or simply Natural Nature?

Art2C

The art institution Wanås in southern Sweden is worth a visit - the setting is awesome and the art projects are ambitious.



This was not catalogued as a piece of art but to me it was :-)



Hanne Tierney, Love in the Afternoon, 1996




Filippa Barkman, Still south I went and west and south again, 2010

 

Robert Wilson, A House for Edwin Denby, 2000

Malin Holmberg, I will stop loving you, 2010

.... and then there was these spooky voices shouting or whispering "Mama!" or "Papa!" coming unexpectedly from somewhere in the woods. The piece was I am thinking about Myself, 2003 by Marianne Lindberg de Geer.

And much more.

Accretion

I am not sure whether art is capable of changing the world or not, but it certainly can change our conception of the world - I took this photo because I saw a naturalized Eva Hesse installation, while my husband and kids who made it, saw homemade sticks meant for making camp fire breads.

Airy Thoughts

It's time to sow all the airy thoughts I get, when I am high flying:

...and

then I am off to Sweden to check out other kinds of Allotment Plots.

Forever wild

a dream

a promise

a statement

an illusion

an invention

a lie

a truth

a tale

forever wild

Evolution documented!

Which evidence is there for the existence of Evolution? Well, I saw it with my own eyes in Soho, New York! Even though I could hardly believe, what I saw: frieze dried rats and mice, real human skulls and skeletons, fossils and myriads of bugs - some of them encapsulated in candies (uhmmmm!). All for sale in a shop full of costumers in all shapes, colours and ages.

So YES - evolution is fact (all though I cannot tell for sure it wasn't created (by a creative creationist?) ;-)).