Beyond the enchanting image of its literal meaning, the expression Vale of Tears is related in the Christian tradition with the suffering path of life that one has to endure before dying; as to be observed in the homonymous monumental 19th century painting by Gustave Doré. However, the French understanding of “Vallée de larmes” is commonly dominated by a description of the skin lines formed by the passage of tears under the eyes, and notably used in the plastic surgery jargon. Whether a physical quality or a path of life, this title gives the tone for the first Evening. The artist Magali Dougoud and the writer Gesine Palmer will exchange on mourning, remembering, weeping and fluids. The discussion will take place after the projection of the video Le Continuum Bleu by Magali Dougoud and a talk by Gesine Palmer.

The video Le Continuum Bleu by Magali Dougoud connects together all the womxn whose paths and bodies crossed the rivers and canals of the city of Berlin. They died and were killed there but their bodies and minds have risen together to form an original memory that joins distant pasts and potential futures. A new population has emerged from these losses and the violence they carry: the Womxn Waves. According to scientists, they have forgotten to silence one of the X chromosomes in their DNA, altering their identity and changing their shape. By reclaiming the sounds, textures and intervals of their voices they started to rebel. Once the water contained in their bodies merged with the one that contained them, they were ready to build a common body for the uprising. […] In a poetic approach and a narrative aesthetic close to speculative fiction, the video questions the intrinsic violence of societies and mostly the one directed against womxn and correlates it with the domination exercised by humans over nature. What will we reconstruct together from all our losses?

What does it mean to cry? What are tears made of? Why do emotional tears differ from tears caused by onions? What are their purposes and how do they define us individually, collectivity, as a society? Gesine Palmer unravels this story through the prism of history, mythology and philosophy. Through a careful analysis of social representations, she reveals our relationship to tears and mourning highly gendered up until today. During this evening and in resonance with the projection of Le Continuum Bleu, Gesine Palmer is invited to open the theme of crying as a form of resistance against loss and as an indicator for physical reality as well as an element regulating social life in the grieving process. 

Laure Boer

The score addresses the difficulty to relate to the abstraction of the covid-19 pandemic on a global scale on one side, and the falling in a period of torpor on a personal scale on the other side. The composition is built both, on the Robert Koch Institute’s statistical data of the number of deaths due to the pandemic in Germany as well as on photographs of everyday life during this period. The first part of the score was based on the four seasons of the year 2020 and was presented as part of “Composite by the Numbers” (curated by Dayang Yraola). For CLOUDS ON CLEAR SKY, the score will be extended by 3 additional seasons corresponding to the duration until the launch of the project in September.

For this edition, the piece – which can be performed by 3 to 13 musicians – will be interpreted by Laure Boer (dan bau), Pina Bettina Rücker (quartz sound bowls made of silicon) and Evelyn Saylor (vocals), all three bringing their own interpretation and musical particularities to the project. Each musician chooses a line. Where there is a light, there is a sound. This can mean volume or intensity, depending on the instrument. The ellipses are total silences referring to the amount of deaths in Germany. The photos and the seasons act as a narrative frame for the compositions. In this frame one comes back to very basic transcriptions of sensations: where you have light, you have sound. A way to transcribe the feeling of torpor, uncertainty and the necessity to move forward each day, step by step.

Carrie McILwain

Grief and Gratitude is a research focusing on the cemetery as a garden, and the edible plants which grow therein. Over the past months the artist has been harvesting from graves and untended wild sites of growth within cemeteries throughout Berlin. In private ritual the artist transformed the foraged materials into pesto, syrups, marmalades and candies.

Interested in the cyclical or constant transformation possible when one eats from the garden of death – This work reflects on eating as a necessary violence; a site of sacrifice and incorporation as one material loses its form and agency to become with and sustain the life of another. If every meal can awaken a narrative of death, what role can gratitude play in this daily performance? How can we acknowledge the inevitable transformations which accompany death? – How do ritual meals reinforce separations, forge communion and feed hungry ghosts?