Stew and Pipe day

I arrived in Tallinn yesterday. Jaanika was waiting for me at the airport and collected me in her new car. After dropping the bags off at Polymer we went for lunch in Teliskivi and a cool little cafe there. Last year it was used for the university degree show but now it has totally changed. The cafe is very rustic but the food is amazing and we had lunch for less that 10euros.


Today Sandra and I decided to make food to sell at the festival to make some money. Sandra made pies and I made an Irish stew but they have no lamb here so I used beef. I hope it is okay.


The pies are finished now, but you can't see them until tomorrow! The stew also needs time to rest.

We had tomato, rocket and caper soup for tea. Some of the performers joined us.

Of course then we had tea.And more tea. And then we had a visit from Super Mario.

The heating in the room is a stove with a pipe to take the smoke outside. The pipe was rusted so the guys here had acquired some new piping but then the next problem was how to replace it. My room is one floor up and the pipe goes from outside my window to above the roof. After one failed attempt we Polymered the pipes and tried again - it worked!!

All the time Kimberly Bianca is at the end of the hall working on her performance for tomorrow. It's loud. She says it's somewhere between a concert and performance poetry - it's looking and sounding pretty epic. She's made CD's and booklets which she's printed on the letterpress print they have here at Polymer. I can't wait to see how it all goes.

Tanel is painting the gallery white where I will be performing. I told him I am making boring art to contrast with all the excitement of the rest of the day. I'm still not sure entirely of the details. Most of it will be about the suitcase of paper I took from Dorset.

Also today I spoke with Mai Soot who is a brilliant performance artist. She says we don't have to understand everything and that we also can't make a brilliant performance every time. Some are better than others for many reasons.

I feel a number of things about my planned performance. Outwardly I am calm and non-chalant about it, but also hinting at the fact that it will not be like the other work on show. I've met all the other artists now. A couple from New Zealand, a girl who has graduated from the same college Sandra went to, Kimberly, Eric - Mai's partner and Hanna. Here sat in my room I wonder what will happen for my performance. I want it to develop by itself. To have a starting point and then for the audience to decide how it goes from there. It will be up to them how long it lasts, whether it is fun or serious. I must decide what I will wear. I was thinking of dressing up like I was going to one of the big events in Bournemouth. I will have to imagine what Violet would suggest I wear. I have good accessories and I will dye my hair. I have no dress. Maybe tomorrow I will buy a dress.

1st week Wednesday

Today I woke up a year older. It took me a while to motivate myself to roll out of my comfy bed out into the cold. Flashes of last night’s conversations came to mind. It was the house dinner which lasted about 7 hours. There was the traditional marinated raw fish and onions, lots of cabbage, eggs and pickles, and of course vodka.
We were in the ceramic room because it's the warmest and biggest room in the factory. We talked a lot about our journeys to this point, our experiences, ways of living, projects we'd stuff we wanted to do, hairiness (male and female), boob jobs, sex maniacs, aura photography, loneliness of cities, maths, cats, mice... All the important stuff!

So today when I'd got myself together I went for a walk to the old town. I made some postcards and took pictures and did the tourist thing. I found the train station where I got a hot pizza for about 50p - it was heaven after all the cabbage!

Didn't really do any work today. I'd started editing some footage from a few months ago. I think I'll get on with that this evening and start on the paper tomorrow. In the meantime here are some pics from today.

I'm here at last

Welcome to my new home!

Marina woz ere!




Hopscotch on the way to the west wing!




And a roof garden :-)

After a long couples of days in London I arrived in Tallinn late Sunday night. Jaanika (who's the administrator at Polymer) met me at the airport. On Monday morning we dragged my bags up the stairs to my new home for the next month.

I spent the rest of Monday getting lost in the outskirts of Tallinn and eating cabbage based foods. Today is my second day and things are starting to settle a little. In the back of the factory there is an old, but working wood block printers run by a lady called Uda. I haven't met her yet but I've been taking care of her waste paper. I've spent hours tearing it up and it's in a big bucket soaking in water now til 2moro.

At lunch I took my break in the bar area where some students were doing some performance art. It involved candles, paper, blood, cotton wool, flour, water and soap and was thoroughly entertaining. And I did feel a bit sick too!

Tonight there will be a house meal and I will hopefully get the chance to meet the rest of the artists here. So far I've met Sandra and artist/curator who runs Art Container, Telin who makes mechanical objects for performance, Hanz who's a musician, Leho who gave me the password for the Internet, Ernest who lives here and runs the residencies and Eric who teaches the students mentioned above.

Right, must go, time for tea!