Aya Zamir

April 2019

www.ayazamir.com

KuBa in Klein Warnow at the beginning of April, I was expecting the spring but the weather was still cold, the trees were covered with coloured plastic eggs, precursor to the coming easter. I had a broken foot and was just informed by the doctor that I should continue wearing the cast during all the AIR period. In fact I needed to learn walking again after a month and a half. Slowly and with Yuli’s help I walked every day a few more steps. At the middle of our time in KuBa, I could let go of my crutches and by the end of the time at KuBa I already explored the surrounding independently.
Yuli Zakay worked parallel to me. We both had some basic Ideas about what we might do there, but they changed with the time and the familiarity with the people shaped our works to fit in the place.Yuli worked on a project of returning the wolfs into the forest, she made videos and installations and a performance of turning from a white wolf into a black wolf.
Later on Gaya joined and worked on painting and photography. As we were native Hebrew speakers there was a feeling that a small settlement was established at a village in east Germany. Reviving a language that was attempted to be wiped out from the area years before.
I was very impressed from the deep thought behind the organisation of the space and the nice working environment. The neighbourhood was very kind to us, inviting, and showed interest in our projects.

I have decided to explore the issue of perspective while drawing threw the different windows of the building. I painted on different formats to explore perspective changes, one of the paintings was planed to be made from one painting project was a breakable format, when each fragment becomes an independent painting. Every week I wrote a letter to KuBa’s artistic directors of what I managed to achieve, rising questions about the continue of the journey there, that helped me to construct the project.

When I heard the story of Klein Warnow I could not ignore the connection to a short tale I learned in high school.  About a small village with a train station by A.B. Yehoshua ”מסע הערב של יתיר“, I had an idea that the story name should be translated as The „Twilight Journey of The Left“ and not as it is officially translated to Yatir’s Twilight Express. It seemed fitting better to the political dynamic in the world and my memory for the story intention. I decided to read the story again while writing it from a PDF file. It became part of my daily routine, between drawing, cooking or lightning the fireplace. With the help of Klaus workshop that lays on the railroad (the front door neighbour), I stitched my handwriting to a scroll.At the end of the residency, we could all enjoy sunny days in the garden, with the snow of pollens dancing around us. Cheb and Sharon curated for the open studio the window-drawings, the paintings and the scroll with a translated book of the story. And binoculars so you could look into Claus Workshop. The visitors could see the remains and documentation from Yuli’s performance. And the work of the other artists in residency at the time next to works of many other artists that become part of the community, that is engaged to the place.