LECTURE PERFORMANCE // as part of ‘Estonia week’ // in English
Post-show discussion after the performance
Over the last few years, artists’ frequent questioning of their own position has become a canonised practice on contemporary stages. Estonian artist Maike Lond Malmborg, who creates art in »white spaces« and »black cubes«, sets out to tackle this theme from a new and fresh angle. Malmborg's lecture-performance is the result of highly subjective research on the possible outcomes of recent political trends, highlighting the way in which cultural and private sector financial interests are merging. She presents the results of her experiments without a trace of cynicism, and almost completely restrains herself from making value judgements, a tragi-comic unmasking of a limping system. We could laugh at all this, if it wasn’t so real...
The project started with the outlining of a dream scenario in which Malmborg – harking back to the era of romanticism – would be able to break her dependence on artistic fashion, art institutions, curators, public funds, and the politics of the Ministry of Culture, by establishing a long-lasting relationship with a patron. Assisted by Kaja Kann, she embarked on an 18-month investigation into the potential ways of fulfilling her dream, ranging from encounters with possible patrons and sponsors, through to the opportunities offered via an actual employer/ employee relationship and by being a member of a discussion panel on Estonian national TV.
The title for ‘10 journeys to a place where nothing happens*’ is taken from Finnish artists Juha Valkeapää's and Taito Hoffrén's performance of the same name, in which they present a cozy artistic world to the audience, one in which an artist can be, do/ do not, and think, without any concern for money or finances. As in reality the world of an artist is, in contrast, continually filled with financial worries, Malmborg has been trying to make her own personal 'cozy world' a possibility with the help of the financial sector.
Concept, performance: Maike LOND MALMBORG
Assisted by: Kaja KANN
MAIKE LOND MALMBORG
Maike Lond Malmborg (born 1981) has created a number of notable works which have brought her international recognition. Her career started on a high, with her graduation work ‘Sirquit Garden’ being nominated for the Netherlands Media Art Institute’s René Coelho Award. In 2009, after a few years of low-key activity, she achieved her first international breakthrough with ‘Postuganda’, a concert-performance collaboration with Riina Maidre, which was warmly received by both by the mainstream and queer/feminist audience. After some smaller projects she returned to the public eye as part of the MIMproject artists collective (of which she is a founding member) who won the Estonian Cultural Endownment Grand Prix with the large-scale fictional exhibition ‘Manfred MIM retrospective’. After that her fortunes changed for the worse, and she ended up begging from strangers, a journey which ultimately resulted in the performance-lecture entitled ‘10 journeys to a place where nothing happens*’, which has been touring actively in Europe since 2013, continuing to do so in 2016.
In 2015 she created two new pieces – ‘Immerwahr’, in collaboration with Belgian artist Pieter de Buysser, and after that ‘99 Words for Void’, conceived with Swedish artist Iggy Lond Malmborg.
www.esztorszag.hu
http://www.mimproject.org/
https://saal.ee/en/performance/4096
Post-show discussion after the performance
Over the last few years, artists’ frequent questioning of their own position has become a canonised practice on contemporary stages. Estonian artist Maike Lond Malmborg, who creates art in »white spaces« and »black cubes«, sets out to tackle this theme from a new and fresh angle. Malmborg's lecture-performance is the result of highly subjective research on the possible outcomes of recent political trends, highlighting the way in which cultural and private sector financial interests are merging. She presents the results of her experiments without a trace of cynicism, and almost completely restrains herself from making value judgements, a tragi-comic unmasking of a limping system. We could laugh at all this, if it wasn’t so real...The project started with the outlining of a dream scenario in which Malmborg – harking back to the era of romanticism – would be able to break her dependence on artistic fashion, art institutions, curators, public funds, and the politics of the Ministry of Culture, by establishing a long-lasting relationship with a patron. Assisted by Kaja Kann, she embarked on an 18-month investigation into the potential ways of fulfilling her dream, ranging from encounters with possible patrons and sponsors, through to the opportunities offered via an actual employer/ employee relationship and by being a member of a discussion panel on Estonian national TV.
The title for ‘10 journeys to a place where nothing happens*’ is taken from Finnish artists Juha Valkeapää's and Taito Hoffrén's performance of the same name, in which they present a cozy artistic world to the audience, one in which an artist can be, do/ do not, and think, without any concern for money or finances. As in reality the world of an artist is, in contrast, continually filled with financial worries, Malmborg has been trying to make her own personal 'cozy world' a possibility with the help of the financial sector.
Concept, performance: Maike LOND MALMBORG
Assisted by: Kaja KANN
MAIKE LOND MALMBORG
Maike Lond Malmborg (born 1981) has created a number of notable works which have brought her international recognition. Her career started on a high, with her graduation work ‘Sirquit Garden’ being nominated for the Netherlands Media Art Institute’s René Coelho Award. In 2009, after a few years of low-key activity, she achieved her first international breakthrough with ‘Postuganda’, a concert-performance collaboration with Riina Maidre, which was warmly received by both by the mainstream and queer/feminist audience. After some smaller projects she returned to the public eye as part of the MIMproject artists collective (of which she is a founding member) who won the Estonian Cultural Endownment Grand Prix with the large-scale fictional exhibition ‘Manfred MIM retrospective’. After that her fortunes changed for the worse, and she ended up begging from strangers, a journey which ultimately resulted in the performance-lecture entitled ‘10 journeys to a place where nothing happens*’, which has been touring actively in Europe since 2013, continuing to do so in 2016.
In 2015 she created two new pieces – ‘Immerwahr’, in collaboration with Belgian artist Pieter de Buysser, and after that ‘99 Words for Void’, conceived with Swedish artist Iggy Lond Malmborg.
www.esztorszag.hu
http://www.mimproject.org/
https://saal.ee/en/performance/4096
Cultural Endowment of Estonia
Co-producer: Kanuti Gildi SAAL
