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LandArt '09 | Hard stones by soft hands

Artistic Residence | Day 21
LandArt '09 | Hard stones by soft hands

We’ve reached the third week of work. We can say that the result, so far, is in the prospects of the schedule provided by the organization. 

Today it is Saturday, the week end, but here, Saturday is different from the Western Saturday. In JiuXian it is only weekend on the calendar, as the village keeps the same pace every day. The only difference is school, the national anthem is not heard at 10 am, when the national flag is hoisted up, and all students look stiff and sharp. But the school keeps its doors open so that children can play and have fun in the yard that takes them every day. 

Also, there are more Chinese tourists and foreigners, because in large cities, Westernization is taking its space. 

Retirees spend their days taking care of their grandchildren and playing cards, in any available corner.

From time to time, they get courage and come close to the works that have been held, interacting with the artists using gestures or translated - with the help of the of some Chinese students who participate in this great project. 

The group of artists is adopting the Chinese pace and continuing with their work. At lunchtime, taking a river walk, and sniff the strange houses of the villagers. 

Michel Batlle has already made known the first strokes of his triptych, which is to be exposed in the Exhibition Center. 

Today, Filipa Silveira accepted that her first work is finished, although she believes that this intervention has no ending. Each day, while passing by, she adds another stone; stones that were placed carefully, one by one, brought by herself from the surrounding countryside. 

Having more time, Filipa wouldn’t do more than simply add one, and another stone. If she were to come back within 10 years, she would like to see it transformed and consumed by nature, as the human body does, also transforms and disappears. 

Her work has no name, as she would never baptize her feelings. Her intervention is based on a drawing she presented on her application. So far, more than a sculpture or installation, it is a drawing in nature. 

We can walk, step, fall and meditate on it. 

This site seems to have been waiting for it, such a perfect relationship that exists. According to Filipa, is so inspiring, that the work has a very natural form. 

We could interpret it as the payload of a lifetime and its journey expressed in a simple intervention, temporal, as if one day life took a new direction, because time will give stones, the place they came from. 

A work in parallel to her life, with a course, which is done and undone over time, made of hard stones by soft hands. With several different textures and tones, it seems that the colour doesn’t yet takes place..

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