Meeting Point: Büyükhüsun /// Workshops
Meeting Point project is conceived to have workshops forming the core of all activities that will be carried out during the project week. Although each workshop deals with issues specific to that discipline, there is always a leitmotif that unites them all. In that sense, each course is also a means to document different aspects of village life. The idea is not only to be able to bring life force from a different source and of a different origin into the space of the particular village, but also to be able to find a way of bringing people from different backgrounds together in a working environment. All the four workshops of Meeting Point: Büyükhüsun are conceptualised as work in progress towards an end product(ion) in which the participants' input will be an important influence. We hope to achieve a lively environment suitable both for producing quality work and fruitful dialogue amongst those who work in all different disciplines.
*Official language of the workshops is English. All workshops will have translators helping the communication between the villagers and the English speakers.
Each workshop will have an approximate number of 10 participants. In order to encourage interaction with the village, each workshop participant is expected to join a social work group. Social works will include basic tasks such as picking up vegetables, watering plants, mowing grass, painting walls that will help the villagers in their daily burden; or assistance in preparation of the festival. Social work is thought of as an activity not exceeding 6 hours in the week.
Additionally, during the week, site tours to Assos and Kozlu village will be organised as recreational activities adding to the appreciation of the region.
Art Workshop: Window Obscura
Course Leader: Anita Bačić*
The workshop will concentrate on the foundations of photography where light from the sun creates an image. Simple camera obscura (Latin for dark chamber or room) principles will be used to explore the image and contemporary interventions will be made on the dark chamber and use of sunlight. The processes will involve simple means: cardboard boxes, recycled and reconfigured to create a new purpose – a pinhole camera using simple light to explore the image.
In the workshop, participants will be invited to construct their own pinhole cameras and use cardboard boxes with a pinhole to capture images of the world outside – the village and its inhabitants together with the workshop participants themselves. They will pair up and be encouraged to explore the village and its surrounds. The boxes will be large enough to wear as a headpiece – an analogue virtual reality device. Seeing the world outside upside down – encouraging questions ...
What is it that we are actually seeing?
Is it our mind playing tricks?
Is it the real world outside?
Following on from these investigations larger wooden boxes will be created. These boxes will be used to capture images on cloth using the cyanotype technique. The cloth will be of similar style to that used on a daily basis in the village for scarves and other domestic purposes. The boxes will be mobile in order to encourage exploration with the new image-capturing devices exploring the village itself. Once the image has been fixed with water, the cloth will become a tactile photograph.
*Born in Australia, Anita Bacic's works engage with the human need to network, interact and communicate with other individuals. Much of her previous work involved a vigorous examination of the various technologies that have facilitated communication over the centuries. Recently, Bacic has shown her works in the Australian Network for Art and Technology's Portable Worlds exhibitions (2007 - 2009), Guildford Lane Gallery, Melbourne (2008), DigitalFringe – The Melbourne Fringe Festival (2007), OUTVIDEO '07 – International Video-Art Festival in Public Spaces in Moscow and St Petersburg (2007), Art Tech Media 07 in Madrid and Centre Pompidou in Paris (2007). She also took part in screenings and exhibitions in San Francisco (US), Sao Paulo (BR), Salvador (BR), Stuttgart (DE), Nagoya (JP) and various cities in Australia. She has attended many residency programmes, including the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris and ArtSpace in Sydney, Australia.
Design Workshop: Regarding the Discarded
Course Leaders: Michael Bom and Antoinet Deurloo (Atelier Bomdesign*)
The workshop will be an exploration of design as a way of offering playful and functional solutions and proposals by using discarded materials, inspired by local crafts and traditions. There will initially be a research phase of the workshop where the everyday life of the inhabitants of the village and their use and reuse of materials will be explored, available discarded materials in the village and surroundings will be investigated and documented, and the potential of these materials will be researched.
The ideas and sketches will lead the participants towards their new design object, which they will arrive at through playing around with the material of their choice, also utilising crafts available in the region. The final products will be shown in an exhibition at the end of the workshop.
There might also be an additional paper workshop, if time allows, in which, methods used in the village to extract natural dyes from the roots and leaves of plants will be explored and used in making coloured papers. The paper making technique can also be used as part of the design workshop.
*Renown eco-friendly design office Atelier Bomdesign is established in Rotterdam in 1995 by Michael Bom and Antoinet Deurloo. Recognised for their hand made and reused materials for their work in the design scene, they explore materials and their technical use to find possibilities that lead to surprising and original solutions in art, product design or graphic design. The designers' works are being sold in worldwide shops such as Tricebi (IT), Hitherto (UK), Reformschool (US), Strand West (NL), CBK (NL), Graphic Design Museum (BE), and Design Center De Winkelhaak (BE). Their famous booklamp was selected as among the '101 Beautiful, Innovative But Environmentally Friendly Designs' by Wallpaper magazine in 2007. They attended numerous international shows, fairs and projects in the Netherlands, USA and Sweden and worked together with 2012 Architects on couple of exhibitions.
Performance Workshop: Local Moves, Local Grooves
Course Leaders: Women of Büyükhüsun, Özlem Alkış*, Çiğdem Ergun and Özlem Ergun**
In the workshop, the components of folk dances Harmandalı and Karşılamalar will be explored under the guidance of women of Büyükhüsun. The dances learned will be deconstructed and experimented with under the supervision of Özlem Alkış, Çiğdem Ergun and Özlem Ergun. Harmandalı dance, as a symbol of courage and honour, has two versions that are played and performed at a different pace in different regions, yet always accompanied by the same tune. The course will focus on the Marmara Harmandalı, a form hastier in music and performance than the Aegean version which precedes it at least a hundred years. What is interesting about another regional folk dance Karşılamalar is that it is performed only by women. This dance is played with two or more performers facing one another. As the Marmara Harmandalı evolved in time, in a way recycling the Aegean original, the workshop will explore intervening with these dance forms and experiment on the possibilities of introducing contemporary components aiming to come up with a final work.
*Özlem Alkış is a dance artist based in Istanbul. After receiving her dance education in ex.e.r.ce at Centre Choréographique National de Montpellier in 2003, she followed essais choreographic formation between 2005-2006 in Centre National de Danse Contemporaine-Angers with the support granted by the French State. She worked with Loïc Touzé, Deborah Hay, Sabine Jamet, Emre Koyuncuoğlu as a dancer and produces her own dance work since 2003. She is one of the co-founders of BPA, Body-Process Arts Association and Çatı, Contemporary Dance Artists Association in Istanbul.
**Born in Gülpınar village of Çanakkale, Çiğdem Ergun and Özlem Ergun teach at 18 Mart University's, Faculty of Education's, Music Education Department and Sports & Physical Education Department respectively. The two sisters have led the music and creative drama workshops at Meeting Point: Gülpınar in 2007. Being born and brought up in the Northern Aegean, their inherent knowledge of the region offers an unlimited source of inspiration and know how in communicating with the local communities.
Local Cuisine Workshop:
Course Leaders: Women of Büyükhüsun
Course Coordinator: Hasan Açanal*
The Local Cuisine workshop is based on the idea of getting to know a culture through its culinary habits. Under the guidance of the women of Büyükhüsun, participants will be preparing local recipes, investigating methods of preserving and consider the concept of recycling in the realm of food.Participants will be preparing a different local meal everyday, under the guidance of the women of Büyükhüsun. The workshop will be practically led by the women from the village, and coordinated by Hasan Açanal. Preservation processes such as sun drying, summer pickling, making house jam and tarhana (a local soup of dried curd and flour) in addition to preparation of local ceremony dishes will be explored throughout the course. The recipes prepared will be documented. The participants will also be working on designing a recipe that they will prepare for the final feast marking the last day of the workshops. This feast prepared by the local cuisine participants will be consumed in the village square all together with the villagers.
*Prof. Hasan Açanal is the chairman to the Turkish branch of the Conservatory of Mediterranean Cuisines and an expert on Turkish cuisine culture. Hasan Açanal has been officially representing the Turkish Cuisine on behalf of the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism, International Olive Oil Council, Conservatory of Mediterranean Cuisines and Turkish Wine and Olive Oil Producers, in Turkey and abroad, for more than 15 years. He is currently teaching Turkish Culinary Culture at the Istanbul Yeditepe University, School of Fine Arts, Department of Gastronomy.
