sailor yoga

Yoga beats the Valentine! :)

*author of the puppet sailor: Alex Dubravicka
Thank You!

The Nose

Once a year all puppeteers from Belgium (the Flemish part mainly) get together. This time, there was a Puppetry Forum in Mechelen, where the expertise center for the cultural heritage of the performing arts in Flanders - Het Firmament, is active. (uff, what a sentence...)

Among other things, this meeting offered an installation by Niké Moens called "The Nose". She is an all - round artist, stage designer, puppeteer from Antwerp. She works for example with Co Frieda and Theater Froefroe. "The Nose" is an interactive exposition according to Gogol's short story. 

Moens installed Walkmans (yes, playing on cassettes!) on small tables and while listening to the story, you could make the puppet of Major Kovalyov or his NOSE alive. You  could try to fish it in an aquarium, or even exchange it for sweets (a Belgian traditional candy called "the nose"). 

This enjoyable, refreshing and poetical installation made us all happy and inspired, believing again, that puppets make sense :)

How we exchanged rings

Ha ha, another scary title:) 

No, nobody got married this time. We were just lucky and by accident discovered the project "Wanna Swap Your Ring?" by Ted Noten in one gallery in Oslo. Of course we wanted to be part of it! We made our own rings (ok, my friend Petra made two very cool conceptual rings) and we swapped them for the pink Miss Piggy ring. I am not very jewellery friendly, but this ring is just super fun!

Through the slit

This year started with a responsible travelling and keeping our promises to visit our far away friends. We spend four cool (literally) days in the Norwegian capital, Oslo. Our guide and great host Petra showed us, apart from loads of galleries and museums, also her own work. Petra is a contemporary artist specialised in sculpture, installation art, and she also makes beautiful rings!! We couldn't miss one of her great installations, which she made in the part of Oslo called Grünerløkka. 

Following the river and the map, you can find five objects, or as the author calls them - small observatories. If you look through them and combine them with the distant location you'll get a funny and interesting result. Like, a little guy climbing a chimney of the nearby brewery or jumping into a waterfall.

Unfortunately two of them were already missing and also it was too dark (and cold) to take a proper picture, but here's a small taste of it. Go, find them yourself, the little hidden acrobats in Oslo.

Find out more about Petra P. Petrikova on http://www.trikratpe.com/

                                                                                        

The dog in Middelkerke

(Middelkerke is a small town at the sea. Yesterday, while I was collecting new inspiration in this area, I saw him staring at the moon and thinking. Maybe about his dog days. Or about hot dogs.) 

three creatures I met last week in Vienna and two interesting guys I met yesterday in Ghent

Meeting a fluffy goat (third from the left, first pic) or, mechanical puppets (the one with a hat was opening and closing his mouth) can be sometimes very refreshing. Especially, when there is not much of cultural events going on. Or I just don't have the time/energy/money to join them.  Or I have to work on my own 'cultural events' and I need inspiration. May we have a very inspiring new week!! 

a mysterious walk in Ellezelles

Few weeks ago we made a short trip to a wallonian town with a beautiful name - Ellezelles. I love the name. I can't remember it or pronounce it, but i love it. This place is mainly known as a birth place of Hercule Poirot. And in the 1910 the local witch Quintine was hanged and burned here. We thought, that's it. But than we got surprised by a mysterious path full of strange installations. Following the arrows on the ground, we discovered the narrow streets of Ellezelles and they led us thru the old town to meet Quintine. In her liquid form;)