Traveling to Turku: April 2009

by Ingeborg Pock

„Lichtwechsel“- “The Change of Light”:

ERDEN
(German for the plural of the planet Earth, definition of various types of soils, verb/American : to ground).

To set out for a journey also means to start out , to take along , to pack..
Taking along necessary items, personal things…items for an art project.
To set out for a journey is to experience encounters in foreign settings, to find one´s own identity reflected and growing in a new context.
To set out for a journey also means to pass on ideas and /or items. It also means to connect to people.
An exchange of ideas and ideals, facts of life and figures becomes the ideal goal of the journey.
For my trip to Turku I will take along small containers filled with local earth.
These samples of the typical local soil will be my special present to the countries on the way to Turku. In exchange I will take samples of earth from the countries that I will visit. When returning home the earth from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland will be placed in the area of my home. The process of collecting and dispersing the samples of earth will be documented. The patriotic and local meaning of earth will be dissolved by this act of conscious transfer from one country to the other.

In some of my most recent works I have used earth/soil as a pigment. The act of transfer of the samples of earth collected on this journey will not leave a visible trace in the sense of becoming part of an object of art. The process of packing up the particles of local earth / soil, becoming part of my ”art luggage”, the aspects of exchange and returning it back to new local settings will be the goal of this project taking place on the journey through the Baltic countries, with Turku, Finland, being the final point of arrival.

Ingeborg Pock , Stainz , Austria, March 2009