Sigrid Pawelke´s Statement

Sigrid Pawelke´s statement regarding her powerful performance contribution to the Misplaced Women? (performance workshop conducted by Tanja Ostojić) in front of the Sephora beauty shop, shopping district of the City of Aix-en-Provence, December 16, 2016.

The context:

In a city like Aix-en Provence, one of the most culturally and economically rich in France where its native sons Cezanne and Victor Hugo help to guarantee an extremely profitable tourism industry to this day, the city politics reinforce this anachronism of the 19th century as contemporary combined with the “culture of appearance”.

The expansion of the old city in the last several years provided even more space for the monoculture of appearance, with the opening of one multinational clothing shop after another – a paradise of consumerism.

In September 2016 at the height of the refugee crises in Europe, the right wing mayor declared that the city of Aix had already welcomed enough refugees and would not take any more.

But what refugees does this mayor mean? The ones who voted for her like the “pieds-noirs”, the French-Algerians, almost a million of whom came to the region after the French-Algerian war in the early 1960’s? Or the Italians, Spaniards, Corsicans and Polish who arrived throughout the 20th century, and let’s not forget the “Gypsies”,  the Roma people.

Due to this context I launched a symposium “migrations – strategies of creation” at the School of Visual Arts in Aix and invited Tanja Ostojić to come speak and hold a performance workshop.

In the frame of her “Misplaced Women?” performance workshop I chose to do my performance right in front of the Sephora beauty shop, which stands for the monoculture of stereotyped female consumers and the high pollutive nature of cosmetics waste worldwide.

This “interspace” between the shop and the public space out on the street is very interesting – where does the private-public space of the shop end and where does the public space of the pedestrian alley begin? French law provides three principles for the use of public space: “Liberté, égalité, gratuité” (Liberty, equality, freedom-as in ‘take this [item] for free’)

There are laws governing these spaces and the interpretation of the laws by the person who is paid to watch and ensure safety, i.e. the modern day private security guard.

So I started to install myself right in this in-between space to challenge the security guard as well as the passersby and the customers of the beauty shop.

I arrived with a backpack filled with plastic bags and a few other belongings, wearing rather casual, well-worn street clothes.

The minute I started, I put on my “invisible” performance protection wall around me in order to pursue the task of “putting everything inside out”.

Then I began to empty all my bags: there were maybe five or six creating a scene of the so called “bag lady” and people were starting to wonder what I was doing or searching for, including the security guard who appeared hesitant to come over or ask himself whether or not what I was doing was legal, being so close to the shop? Maybe because I am a woman he held himself back so as not to interfere too much in my business in the beginning.

Next I pulled off everything I was holding inside my clothes, out of my jacket and pans pockets. In the end I took off my shoes. So I stood there in the middle of December without shoes or jacket. That was the point when the security guard came up to ask me:

“What are you doing?”

“I am just searching for something,” I answered.

“Hurry up because people are already watching. And move further away from the shop!”

The rest of the people, passersby and customers partially tried to ignore me, since that is the usual behaviour of people who do not want to get involved, neither mentally nor physically.

Under the staring eyes of the security guard I just kept slowly continuing my performance, showing no sign of inhibition due to the treatment of the security guard until everything was packed up again and then I walked away.

 

The most striking part for me was the feeling of being an object of disturbance to someone, while at the same time being almost totally invisible to the rest, as if I didn’t exist.

However, I am a white European so visually I did not stick out of the crowd and my outfit was still “bearable” in regards to standard conventions.

So there I was, feeling what I call a double burden as a female of otherness, but yet being legal as a European in France. It was only due to my appearance that I was safe as I have been so many other times in my life at border crossings or immigration desks. Whereas both sides of my family were refugees after fleeing the Soviet army when Stalin reshaped Europe at the end of World War II. Thanks to the women in my family many of my kin survived and resettled. Women are the first victims in those situations, but on the other hand once they manage to survive they have an incredible endurance and capacity to adapt.

But to come back to 2016 in order to understand a glimpse of the female migration situation you must experience at least for a moment physically and psychologically their condition. That’s where the profound strength lies in Tanja Ostojić’s performance proposals.

And now just imagine being illegal with signs of apparent “otherness” as a female in front of a private security guard in the same context….

________________________________________________________________

Sigrid Pawelke, is professor of art history at the School of Visual Arts at Aix-en-Provence, France, researcher and performer.

Photos: Tanja Ostojić

Responses by participants of the Misplaced Women? workshop in Torry, Aberdeen, March 10, 2016

Responses by the participants of the Misplaced Women? workshop in Torry, Aberdeen:

On the 10^th 0f March 2016, I co-organised and participated in the Misplaced Woman? Workshop with Tanja Ostojic. The Misplaced Women? workshop was organised as a part of the Aberdeen Festival of Politics 2016. During the workshop, participants had a chance to meet the artist Tanja Ostojic in a welcoming and casual settings. People could meet each other, share their immigration stories and expectations from the workshop over a cup of tea/ coffee. Then, the group went out to the streets of Torry in Aberdeen to enact the Misplaced Women? delegated performance. The performance involves unpacking of a bag or a suitcase in a public sphere and recalls the everyday experience of immigrants and refugees, but also of people who move from one city to another. It was not my first encounter with the Misplaced Women? performance and to me, as an immigrant, it always is a powerful experience. This time, the workshop Misplaced Women? made me reflect on mothers. On all the women who must juggle between motherhood and personal development or work. I am among these women too. Luckily, events like this with such inspirational and open minded people like Tanja Ostojic, Amy Bryzgel, and Renée Slater lit up my hope that women will have an opportunity to develop their potential as women. We do not need to act as men in order to have equal rights. We need understanding and equal rights to develop our full potential as women. Thank you for understanding and allowing me to bring my son with me and be the co-organiser and participant of this powerful and inspirational event!  ……………………Marta Nitecka Barche

 

 

 

Misplaced Women?

Vulnerable and malleable, Increasingly strong,
Out with hierarchy
I catch my own self.

Resting only on the skin of others Causing warmth to emanate,
I admire the view
Streaming in from all angles.

Discarded, unfolded rush
Takes place in the uncertainty.
Here, there is no such pain
Breathing in the entirety of all I have left.

Turn upper torso in search of the sun, Inside the wealth of abandonment, Increasingly hinders the
Onset of the time.

And in concern of chaos,
My weathered, kneaded soul Takes sanctuary of being, Free from all I own.

………..Angela Margaret Main

 

I really enjoyed the workshop, I felt vulnerable in the moment but I feel like it gave me confidence in my life. My favourite part of the workshop was watching Tanja perform at the bus stop.

………..Sarah Jackson

 

I liked the discussion that came from the workshop that Tanja did. Although I knew the issues surrounding the refugee crisis, I felt that listening to other participants talk was extremely emotional and powerful. You always hear these stories but when it’s right in front of you it isn’t a story any more.

………….Rowan Young

 

For more images and texts about this workshop please visit as well:

https://misplacedwomen.wordpress.com/2016/06/13/misplaced-women-in-torry-aberdeen-festival-of-politics-march-10-2016/

https://misplacedwomen.wordpress.com/2015/06/01/may-festival-aberdeen/

 

This workshop has been made possible thanks to the generous support of the University of Aberdeen and the Aberdeen Trade Union Council.

 

Misplaced Women? in Torry, Aberdeen, Festival of Politics, March 10, 2016.

Misplaced Women? banner by Marta Nitecka Barche

Text by Caroline Gausden:

As a part of the Aberdeen Festival of Politics 2016, the Misplaced Women? workshop conducted by Tanja Ostojić took place in Torry, an area of Aberdeen separated from the main port and city centre by the mouth of the river. It’s an area with its own distinctive geography. Connected to Aberdeen City centre by three bridges it is also somehow separate and with a strong relationship to the sea. It is easy to imagine it as a place with its own history and stories to tell. When I went to Torry for the first time I was struck by the smell of fish, the sound of the sea and the industrial spaces that dwarfed me as I rode my bike along the coast. I also noticed many different accents that confirmed Torry is a place that holds a diverse community of people who have found it more affordable to live in than other areas of the city. When I came to visit in March it was to meet with Tanja Ostojić in the local community centre and listen to other women speak on their experiences of migration and travel under the umbrella of the festival of politics, hosted by one of the local residents Renée Slater and co organised by Marta Nitecka Barche.

Our base was social centre of Torry, where we first met. We spoke a little bit about why we were there, sharing rich and personal stories around migration and other feelings connected to the idea of being misplaced. We also shared tea and biscuits. I was interested in questions of hospitality and politics in art. As well as this I had recently produced and supported performance art in Torry and wanted to feel what it was like to be on the other side, to perform. In thinking about hospitality I have spent some time trying to decide how it is possible to negotiate the power structures set up by the host/guest scenario. I had thought about the idea that possibly it is only those who have been ‘misplaced’ and know what it feels like to have lost a home that can offer hospitality. I felt that Tanja’s practice was intimately bound up these questions so I was happy that sharing food together, as well as stories of ourselves, round a table was the start of our journey. Tanja was a guest in Torry but also offered us the kind of hospitality that would make it possible to be brave and to move into the uncertain territory of performance art, a foreign land for many of us in the workshop.

After eating we walked out of the community centre, leaving the quiet streets in the area to descend down the hill to the shops and heart of Torry. We were lucky to have a sunny day and a view of the sea. The first place we choose to perform was the front steps of a public library.

Workshop participants in front of the Social Centre, Torry Aberdeen, UK

How did it feel standing outside the library? Angela unpacked things first from a cluttered, unkempt but well loved bag. She made a little line of things on the wall. It seem as though she was meeting a lot of these things for the first time or at least after a long time apart. There were things folded up in things, she stopped as if finished, then realized there was more to be done. I thought about unpacking. I stood on the edge of myself and the public space and paced back and forward. Other people began to unpack in different ways giving us a glimpse of their private worlds some perfectly neat, whilst other more complex. Someone else started to look for something; it became an accidental performance. I delayed. It felt too difficult to start. People started to look on, the librarian paused in the doorway unsure of what was happening. We started to move on. No harm done.

We made it to the bridge and a bus stop. Tanja took that moment to perform. One guy sat at the bus shelter with a group of friends, he watched as she began unpacking. A bus pulled up adding to the suspense. How long would it wait for her? What had been lost? People exchanged glances, questions were hanging in the air. The man on the bench made a decision, he would wait and see what was happening, wherever he was going he decided to delay. His friends left reluctantly without him. A small connection was made between strangers. Meanwhile the rhythm in Tanja’s performance picked up, the pace seemed to be more frantic, she turned items inside out, more stuff was laid out. Finally, at the bottom things were soup stained, a sticky mess. The performance slowed down, started to feel hopeless. Whatever she had been searching for seemed to slip away. She sat on the bench now looking out, spooning in mouthfuls of cold soup from the leaky container. I walked away to find a spot and grab a moment to also perform. I picked somewhere in the sunshine and without waiting dived into my own bag.

Tanja Ostojic´s performance

What are things? I hadn’t really thought too carefully about them before, these things I carry around. That day having taken the leap and begun to unpack, my things felt like little bridges, stretched between people. These objects we travel with make us feel safe, nourished and anxious in equal measure. Kirsty sat next to me unpacking. I decided to emphasize the vulnerability I felt. I piled things in a haphazard way, my papers started to catch in the wind. Kirsty smiled at my ‘filing system’, which was clearly, a broken system, a fragile, human system, under pressure and imperfect. But a system that nevertheless means something to me. I wanted to share what it meant, I was lucky enough to be with people I could share with. What does it mean to get everything out, to feel a little vulnerable but to support each other all the same? It felt good, like I had had a glimpse into another reality and like I would be a better host for having taken the journey.

Caroline Gausend´s performance

 

 

Performance by Ashley McNaughton

 

With the participation of: Karolina Kubik, Caroline Gausden, Angela Margaret Main, Francesco Sani, Gabriel Tracy, Kirsty Russell, Renée Slater, Marta Nitecka Barche, Ashley McNaughton and many other amassing people.

Photos: Amy Bryzgel, Renée Slater, Tanja Ostojic

For more images and texts about this workshop please visit as well:

https://misplacedwomen.wordpress.com/2016/06/13/responses-by-participants-of-the-misplaced-women-workshop-in-torry-aberdeen-march-10-2016/

 

This workshop has been made possible thanks to the generous support of the University of Aberdeen and the Aberdeen Trade Union Council.