“2365132101250005 km long lasting blooming”
mixed media installation
Polyester resin – 33 x 38 x 8 cm, Inkjet print – 100 x 66 cm, 50 x 50 cm, 35 x 50 cm, Wood – dimentions vary.
BA Graduation work / Art Academy of Latvia / VKN
The aim of the work was to observe the environment and relationship between the objects in it and society. To select at least one element, which can be used to create new forms, an installation, which includes a set of meanings that represent the formation of a place’s identity, how it is affected by the architecture, the way it is formed, transformed or lost over time.
In 2019 the municipality of Kuldiga (LV) had planned to demolish the barn of Vārme manor, which had not been used or repaired for years and was in poor technical condition. Their goal was to create a parking lot instead of historical building in Latvian countryside. In this region manor building ensembles have become a space between different cultures and times, which shows past in architectural structures, how they have influenced by different political and economical circumstances and survived to the present day. Vārme manor is located near to place where I grow up, also it was the closest example of the history of art / architecture. To prevent the demolition of these buildings, I was standing for preservation and became interested in the architecture and history of the manors. From the artefacts found in the area of the barn, I created the installation “Parking project” (2019) for the group exhibition “Hospitality” at the Kuldiga Artists’ Residence Gallery. And shortly after that the dismantling was stopped, and the details of decorative wall paintings were discovered indoors in one of the manor buildings under several layers of paint. There was a floral ornament from 18th-century 3rd quarter, the silhouette of which I used when developed objects for the installation “2365132101250005 km long lasting blooming”.
The fragile, semi-transparent but at the same time robust object, made from the polyester resin contains small pieces of dried paint, which were removed from the wall to reveal the previously coated decorative painting. The ornament is removed from the place where it could no longer express or show itself and begins an autonomous existence outside the wall, historical building or manor, movable wherever I want to place, where it takes shape and meaning.
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I proposed to include the manor in the list of cultural monuments, and this building became a State Protected Architectural Monument (in 2021). Installation includes photo prints, and seemingly boring documents – instructions of the preservation of an architectural monument, entrusted on responsibilities and obligations addressed to me. Pictures of the historical manor building is taken in 2021 and also in 1970s from Cultural Monuments Documentation Archive. These photos and documents exposure environment and context of research.
If we assume that the ornament was painted on the wall in Vārme ~ 250 years ago and that one light year corresponds to about 9.5 trillion kilometers (9.46 x 1012 km), the duration after converting units of measure, it is 2365132101250005 km or the understanding of a relatively long distance and the appearance of something far, immeasurable, innumerable, almost infinite.
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Long-term collaboration has taken place between those who have lived in the same environment, between the artist or designer who once painted the flower ornament and the author who noticed it and connected with its opportunity to become an art form and meet the spectator.
ANNEMARIJA GULBE 