Category Archives: Travelling

busy and sweaty summer days

The last weeks have been crazy in the ANTI office. We finally launched the 2010 programme and new website on Monday and I thought Iâ€™m able to have some holidayâ€¦ it didnâ€™t really work out as something unexpected came along and Iâ€™ve been busy sorting that out. Oh well. I still have to go to the office on Monday but after that I will be on holiday until the conference in Cesis, Latvia. That isnâ€™t much so I really have to try hard to get my mind off work but it might be a challenge as I have to prepare for my talk in the conferenceâ€¦ But Iâ€™m really looking forward to spending a few days in Riga and Cesis! â€¨â€¨It has been a bit busy at home, too.

Many passersby on their summer holiday lodging for a few nights and my daughterâ€™s birthday party. But today was a celebration as we finished the home made table for our roof terrace. So far we havenâ€™t had any table and Iâ€™ve been complaining about that so much and just dreamed of being able to dine outdoors. Now we finally can and already did! So nice. The table might not be 100% perfect but I love it already. I didnâ€™t do much, only some paintingâ€¦

The Toy chairs by Philippe Starck, Essence Pitcher by Iittala, design Alfredo HÃ¤berli.Â

It might be that Iceland is calling again…
Essence glass, wine is my new summer favourite Lindemans Early Harvest Semillon Sauvignon blanc, MacBook Pro, Mondo travel guide.

Although it has been really hot, Iâ€™ve tried to push myself to runs regularly. The running skirt has been excellent in this kind of weather and Iâ€™ve really enjoyed my runs. Acts of Clothing shows are coming up so Iâ€™ve also been motivated. My operated knee has been better but Iâ€™m not up for really long runs with it yet. But thatâ€™s ok.

Sunglasses Jackie Ohh Ray Ban, running top Nike Fit, running skirt & shoes Asics, footpod Polar, iPod suffle.Â Â

So yes, my daughter turned 8 and got this gorgeous bicycle as a present from the whole family including grandparents and great grandparentsâ€¦ She was so happy and Iâ€™m really pleased we can cycle more together. Her bicycle is Helkama Jasmine, mine is Aino and my sonâ€™s Jopoâ€¦

Birthday cake and muffins baked by her sistersâ€¦

Wishing you all beautiful summer days.

Johanna

first flowers in the garden

I’ve been so busy that I’ve had no time to focus on the garden -and I’m not a garden fanatic like Aila for example. But still the first flowers in the garden bring me so much joy! My daughter got this idÃ¤nunikko from Aila last year and it opened its first flower a couple of days ago. Also the japaninakileija in the background (small & delicate) is blooming – and it’s also from Aila…

My daughter is working hard in the garden and it’s beautiful to watch how inspired and committed she is. We had such a lovely time a few weeks ago when we planted seeds of carrots, spinach, salad, peas and sunflowers…which are all growing already.

My weekend will be filled with rehearsals of Acts of Clothing, Milk and ANTI Festival stuff like EU excels… But today I felt inspired as I had a meeting with Sonja and a little chat about my upcoming work.

Johanna

weekend in Berlin

I spent last weekend in Berlin seeing exhibitions, walking around and enjoying the spirit of the vibrant and trendy city. I saw exhibitions in Martin-Grobius-Bau which I really liked. I especially enjoyed Olafur Eliasson‘s works -some were just stunning- and it was also great to see once again a retrospective of Frida Kahlo. I’m a bit over with my passion for Frida’s works (I was crazy about her in the 80’s) but I still enjoyed the beautiful exhibition. I think I’ve never seen so many photographs of Frida. What a beautiful woman! Very inspiring. Then I saw the exhibition in Hamburger Bahnhof which was also exciting. Lot’s of works by Joseph Beuys, many fluxus artists, Andy Warhol…
I was lucky to be able to stay in a friend’s place who also kindly drew the routes to walk and streets to hang out on my tourist map. Thank you Jochen! And I just loved the area of Prenzlauer Berg. Great walks, lovely breakfasts…

On the way home, I met some friends at the Helsinki airport and we ended up wondering that why is it exactly that we live in Kuopio… Sometimes it’s hard to remember…

Johanna

days in Hamburg

I’ve been the last three days in Hamburg spending most of my time in the Live Art Festival in Kampnagel. We’ve had A Space Live for Art project meetings about both the artistic and administrational side and today I held a lecture/workshop about artistic interventions in public space to the network of Young Performance Art Lovers. I’ve also seen some great performances by Ivo Dimchev, Ivana Muller, Liquid Loft, Rotozaza and an installation by the Forsythe Company.

Kampnagel foyer with the Forsythe Company’s installation City of Abstracts on the background:

studio where I gave my workshop today:

A Space for Live Art meeting with Claire, Emmanuelle, Cathy, Anne, Jochen and Fabienne:Â

I look really strange, I know – I guess I’m just happy about my beautiful salad (and a glass of wine…):

Rhododendrons blooming not only in the Kampnagel courtyard but all over Hamburg:

A walk in town:

Lovely pink rubbish bags on the streets:

Tomorrow I’m off to Berlin for the weekend. How exciting!

Johanna

Unusually…

hot days. Moments of happiness in the garden with my daughter, planting carrot, salad, peas, spinach and sunflower seeds. A few days off and a chance to think about something else than the upcoming ANTI Festival. A nice evening with the neighbours including great organic white wine, grilled salmon, cake my son baked, the first mosquito bites and sun burns. Two new rhododendrons in the garden.
A hot run and no pain in the operated knee, wearing new Asics running skirt. Slow but steady.
Excited about the upcoming trip to Hamburg and Berlin this week. A bit terrified of all the work that needs to be completed before the tripâ€¦

Johanna

Morning coffee on the balcony:

The Mother’s Dat morning a week ago…with beautiful gifts, cake, pies, sweets, coffee….

City of Women

It was great to visit the City of Women Festival in Ljubljana. Saw some interesting work, met great artists and friends and got to spend a few days in a new city. Diamanda Galasâ€™s concert was fantastic, as well as Alejanda Herrera Silvaâ€™s performance. It was also amazing to learn about the work of Regina JÃ³se Galindo, Nahomi Ximenez, Via Negativa and NataÅ¡a Å½ivkoviÄ‡. And had great talks with Jennie Klein and the artistic director of the festival Mara VujiÄ‡. On the last day of the festival we also had a really good and efficient meeting with A Space for Live Art partners so Iâ€™m all happy about the trip.

Brought back Slovenian salt and chocolate. Walked a lot. Didnâ€™t run with the painful knee.

Nahomi negotiatingÂ if the policeman will accept a hug:

He didn’t so she hugged Mara instead:

Artistic director Mara, Nahomi and Jennie:

The building where my flat was:

After returning home Iâ€™ve realized I have an enormous amount of work ahead of me. This and the upcoming week Iâ€™m performing BODY/HAIR, the week after itâ€™s soft skin / harsh life and then itâ€™s all about the ACTS OF CLOTHING. Really wanted to visit Performa but I really donâ€™t think itâ€™s possible in any way. Unfortunately.

Today I went for a run and rehearsed air acrobatics for BODY/HAIR. Feel really exhausted now.

I ordered new running shoes. Need to do something about the oddly painful knee Iâ€™ve never had before.

See you in the BODY/HAIR performances.

Johanna

impressions & some iconic images of New York

The site-specific performance symposium in New York was very good and exciting and I thank Gulgun, Bertie & Frank for inviting me. It was very important for me to hear about several projects and festivals done by an exciting mix of curators, artists and venues. And in terms of curating and organizing the ANTI Festival, it was also great to feel that we are part of a whole field working site-specifically and sharing a lot of similar concerns, challenges and issues.
My schedule in New York was quite tight and my visit rather short, but here are some images I took during my walks. Many of them are very iconic and typical images of New York but I guess the same images have to be taken over and over again as New York is just amazing. Unfortunately, I don’t have any images of the symposium or my 10k run in the Central Park. I was supposed to participate in a running event here in Kuopio in May but then this trip came about and I couldn’t take part in it. So I promised to myself and my trainer, that I will run 10k on my own in the Central Park, my goal being that I run it in less than an hour. Well, I did it in 58 minutes and it was truly an amazing feeling to be running there. And I was pretty satisfied with my performance that went easily and smoothly.

Images from where I stayed – in the middle of Manhattan:

My hotel Carlton Arms which I can highly recommend:

My stop:

The ruins of WTC:

A walk in Soho:

A boat trip to Staten Island:

Nighttime visit to the Empire State Building:

symposium in New York

Iâ€™m just on my way to New York where Iâ€™ll be giving a talk in one of the panels of Site-specific Performance Symposium in CUNY. The whole symposium looks really exciting and Iâ€™m looking forward to participate in it -and of course to spend a couple of days in NY. If you are anywhere near, please come and here us discussing issues around site-specific performance!

Johanna

finally a weekend at home

Last weeks have been super busy for me as I was performing in Sweden, then went to Brussels and every chance I got, I was working on the new one-to-one performance BODY/HAIR which I premiered last Wednesday in Kuopio. It was a kind of work-in-progress day of performances but Iâ€™m pretty happy with it all. It was quite exciting as to get the soundscape, the costume, the stage equipment and all that together was a real challenge in terms of time and budget so Iâ€™m kind of proud that I was able to pull it together. The performance is quite tough for me to do â€“not so much one but to keep repeating it one after the otherâ€¦ I was really exhausted, friction burned and bruised afterwards. I was also very tired because it has been more than a month since I had a day off. Anyway, I survived it and have the weekend off now. What a luxury.
My performance shoes are the corset boots by Minna Parikka:

Brussels was real nice and green. Kuopio was still very winter like when I left so it felt like a real luxury to see so much green (I stayed near Botanica) and walk in summer shoes. It was a lot of work though as I did a presentation with Gregg about ANTI Festival, then worked with Gregg on completing this yearâ€™s festival programme, saw as many performances as possible in the Trouble #5 Festival and also we had an audit of our A Space for Live Art EU project. Lotâ€™s of work indeed! But it was great to see Gregg and some other artists there like Rosie Dennis, Essi Kausalainen, Guillermo Gomez Pena, the xxx group, Johanna Lecklin etcâ€¦. The nice thing also was that Kuopio had a kind of a heat wave whilst I was away so when I got back, practically all the snow was gone and the weather had really changed.
Brussels:
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Now I have a couple of days off and Iâ€™m just trying to relax and do stuff that at home. Then Iâ€™m staring to prepare my trip to New York. Lotâ€™s of exciting things happening!

Happy Labour Day weekend to everyone! Hauskaa Vappu-viikonloppua kaikille!

Johanna

in Uppsala

My performance at the TUPP-festival went well, I think. I had a great time and had a chance to walk around the beautiful town on Sunday before heading off to the airport.

Tomorrow I’m rehearsing my new one-to-one performance in a theatre Kuopio. Looking forward to that.

Johanna