journey of a wanderer… pilgrim… explorer… adventurer…

THE WALKING PROJECT has grown organically out of this very special and, at times, unsettling period. When the world as we’ve known it started falling apart, I started walking; to find myself in the midst of the storm and to connect with and to my centre;

This project is a pilgrimage.

It is about mountains; about coming back to the elements, what’s elemental and essential; to the earth and the ground.

every walk an exploration. a meditation. a prayer.

finding connection by letting go

sensing and connecting to the ground beneath my feet

arriving, if not, in fact, already being home, with every step along the way.

THIS PROJECT IS INSPIRED BY

+ my intrinsic and essential connection to the mountains and a current very strong calling to go back to and spend time in the mountains.

+ the humbling and equally empowering presence of mountains, which exist as if in another time, the ground for so many deep lessons to learn when spending time amongst them.

+ the wish to bring my work outdoors and embed it into nature.

+ thoughts from the Buddhist tradition, walking meditation – to be arriving with each step. 

+ the ever present iconographic image of “The Wanderer” and the work of the Finnish visual artist: Elena Brotherus 

+ the work of the visionary Ana Helprin

+ a need to connect to the elements and the elemental

+ the art of being, in a playful and intuitive way.

+ the energy of the Raven

THE TRUE MIRACLE IS NOT WALKING ON WATER OR IN AIR,

BUT SIMPLY WALKING ON THIS EARTH

Thich Nath Hanh

1: LOWLANDS / SPRING

walking into a new season

forests, dunes, fields, rivers, lakes and the coast line.

2: MOUNTAINS / SUMMER

walking journey through the Alps and Pyrenees.

I’ve grown up close to the mountains. Throughout my life I’ve been visiting and walking in different mountains such as the Alps, Pyrenees & Montserrat, Himalayas, Mt. Olympus (Greece), White Mountains Crete, Central Mountains of Madeira, GR20 of Corsica, Carrountoohill / Killarney National Park (Ireland). My love and passion for as well as connection to mountains and their territory has been growing.

….to be walking and climbing on mountain paths and trails is a vital dance in itself, depending on the trail or scramble, demanding ultimate focus and presence.

As an essential part of my life, their heritage running in my veins, it’s important for me to be coming back to the mountains, drinking in that atmosphere and air, sensing their power, that is humbling as much as empowering.

And I’ve been feeling a strong wish to bring the performative body and my creative work into the outdoors and, in return, bring what is born out of these travels, adventures and, I want to say, encounters back in form of audio visual and performative work.

In frame of this project, I will go on a journey combining walks in the Jura mountains and two long distance walks in the Alps and the Pyrenees this summer.

I will document this journey with video, photography and writing in order to produce a new film and video installation that I wish to eventually present in combination with a live performance of music and/or dance.

The secret of mountains is that they simply exist, as I do myself. The mountains exist simply, which I do not. The mountains have no “meaning”, they are meaning. The mountains are.

“The Snow Leopard” – Peter Matthiessen

[photos: above – Mt. Olympus / Mytika Greece + northern mountains of Corsica, below – Pyrenees: Vallter 2000 + Aigüestortes]

1: WALK INTO A NEW SEASON

fluid blue runs south
liquid serpent keeps flowing
everywhere at once
.
time has no current
this moment is suspended
the dragon has fallen
.
sun rays kiss the earth
the snake's skin is shedding
a new season

THE PATH IS THE REWARD AND THE AIM.