Artes Mundi's blog

'Museum of the Gaze'

By Morag Colquhoun, Artes Mundi Live Guide

My surname is Colquhoun. From early childhood on I remember spelling my name out C-O-L-Q-U-H-O-U-N and pronouncing it for people ('Cahoon'). I knew that our name signified difference that I needed to explain ('it's a Scottish name').

One of our first jobs as Artes Mundi Live Guides was to learn how to pronounce the artists' names (Adrian Paci is 'Pat-si' in Albanian - not 'Patch-i' which is Italian). I listened to a radio programme the other day about a young Turkish woman's experience of UK immigration. I knew how she would pronounce her name to the immigration official because I have learned that the 'g' is silent in Ergin Cavusoglu's surname.

One of the first things that I spotted in Fernando Bryce's artwork 'Die Welt' ('The World') was the name 'Colquhoun' on a turn of the century book cover copied in pen and ink. Was this a colonial era ancestor of mine who wrote 'The Mastery of the Pacific'?

Other things in 'Die Welt' have caught the attention of others. The map showing the Persian (Iranian) city a museum assistant was named for. The grandfather who showed his grandsons the French newspaper heading that told of British troops entering Baghdad. Only it wasn't the recent conflict. This newspaper was dated 1917 and his cousins from Dinas Powys had been there!  

Fernando Bryce has described his work as a 'museum of the gaze'. Many gazes, not just a western-centric gaze. This is true of 'Die Welt' and it is also true of Artes Mundi, this year selected by a Russian and a Turkish curator.

In Olga Chernysheva's video, 'Russian Museum', we gaze at the relation between Russian people and the paintings they gaze at. When we gaze at the artworks in Artes Mundi we bring our own experiences and we encounter more. 

When I told Chen Chieh-jen how entranced Welsh children were by his film 'Factory', he was pleased. When I told him Welsh children had said that the film had made them think he said (speaking through an interpreter): 'that is the most important thing!'

Algorithm of Survival and Hope?

by Catrin Davies, Artes Mundi Live Guide

Last Friday, year 7 pupils from Cefn Hengoed school came to the Artes Mundi exhibition.  During their workshop, we watched ‘A New Silk Road, Algorithm of Survival and Hope’, by two artists from Kyrgyzstan, Gulnara Kasmalieva and Muratbek Djumaliev.  During this video we watched old trucks from the Soviet era travelling on the Silk Road from Kyrgyzstan to Western China to sell their scrap metal.  Travelling in the opposite direction are the more modern lorries from China, carrying readymade clothes to sell. 

The pupils seemed, at first a little despondent, presuming that this footage of the Silk Road was filmed several years ago.  They were shocked when I told them that the footage was actually filmed as recently as 2006.  As we watched the rhythmic process of these people working, some of the pupils stated that these sorts of jobs could be made by machines in this country.  The pupils were surprised by this more primitive way of working.  They were all in agreement that life on the Silk Road is worlds apart to their lives here in Wales, which made them question why?

Kyrgyzstan was originally a nomadic country.  As they became a part of the Soviet Union, many of the people of Kyrgyzstan were forced to settle and farm.  Today, the country is democratic.  The work here at the Artes Mundi shows how these people have adapted in order to survive and make a living.  The country doesn’t have any natural resources, and the price of importing is high.  They have reverted back to trading on the Silk Road, as they did centuries ago.  Although their lives, perhaps, seem to us like a life of hardship, one could argue that trading the scrap metal with China shows entrepreneurial qualities.  It shows these people’s resilience, and their ability to adapt with a world that is constantly changing.  Although I personally believe that the work, at times, offers a picture of hope, others disagree.  One woman that was on a guided tour thought that Gulnara and Muratbek’s video installation shows a dire situation- and thought that the black smoke puffing out of the old Soviet lorries was a good representation of this.  Despite agreeing that the videos were an interesting insight, she couldn’t see any hope in the art work at all.  We compared the video to a programme we both recently caught that followed the lives of people that scavenged and even lived on the dumps in Lagos, Nigeria. It seemed that the dump is an organized place where the most entrepreneurial of individuals can make a living.  Although it seemed like a hard life, the scavengers have their own form of democracy.  It is difficult for us to imagine what life is like for these people.  We watch their lives from the comfort of our home, or as part of a visit to a contemporary art exhibition. People will disagree whether ‘A New Silk Road, Algorithm of Survival and Hope’ offers hope or not.  What the art work does offer is an insight into the different values that people have, and the different ways these people live their lives, as the pupils of Cefn Hengoed experienced for themselves last Friday morning.

Making art in family workshops

By Catherine Stephens-Ward, Artes Mundi Live Guide

The family workshops are in full swing and are proving to be very popular with children and adults. We have been exploring the trading and manufacturing of goods through several artworks in the Artes Mundi show and making clothes out of paper. Take a look!