The aim of this artistic study is to explore the cultivation practices of Eastern European women through field research and collaboration with their local communities. The field research will take place in Komi Republic (Russia), Armenia and East Germany. During the research, I will explore my family's migration histories, going back to its origins by connecting stories to the land. In doing so, I want to collect the practices of Eastern European women and give them a place among their contemporaries.
My intention is to explore women's cultivation practices in the rural spaces of the former East Block, where the socialist collective work strategies were used and to apply them in a contemporary cultural context. Using an autobiographical study, I will take the path from my first grandmother in Komi Republic to my second grandmother in Armenia and connect the history of Eastern European women with my contemporary life as a migrant woman in Berlin.
Archiving cultivation practices through art will make the implicit knowledge that already exists in rural communities explicit, outline sustainable structures of cooperation and discuss how to use them in a contemporary context. In this way, the study seeks to generate new knowledge through art, to apply knowledge in the contemporary social environment and to create dialogue.
Questions
What knowledge does the rural land-cultivation practices of Eastern European women carry? How do these practices contribute to the reconstruction and creation of interconnected flows between rural and urban public spaces?
Supervised by Professor Dr. Asli Serbest