21.09.2008

No artwork today, due to ball removal.

20.09.2008

Sevi analysed the ball, looking for it's special feature as art. Then he asked if he could buy it.

It costs 1,000 euro. I suggested he tried something cheaper at Intersport.

“So” he said, “if I play football then I’m also part of an artwork".

We talked from soccer to identity, to elections, to cultural studies based on football style. Later, the ball was misappropiated by two guys.

19.09.2008

	Yppenplatz, Ottakring

In Ottakring, some people watching the Turkey-Croatia game jumped when when the final score was set, and floaded the streets with crowds and noise, fireworks, smoke, music, dancing and horns. Car transit was banned in the area, and hundreds of people were out on the road. 

17.09.2008

By linking art to my everyday life I’m making the “art” part dilute: it's less about sovereign aesthetic decisions and more about chance.

11.09.2008

Took the ball to an integration place, where I had an appointment with a cultural anthropologist, about an exhibition with migrant artists. Together, we went through a huge, classy viennese salon, into a smaller, not-so-taken-care-of back room with a meeting table in the center, and older curtains covering a line of plain rectangular windows. “This is where the exhibition is going to be” she said. She's nice and intelligent, and she's probably working with nice people too, but sometimes it seems the "migrant" word has a bit more weight than you're assuming yourself.

10.09.2008

A new visual campaign has started this month for the upcoming elections. One of the candidates shows up wearing a country working shirt, sleeves up, having a full glass of healthy apple juice, beside a full untouched jar of the same drink, all on a nicely set simple wooden table with a white clean simple cloth, in front of a rural, farmer’s, house. And here, with a wide smile showing his white teeth, and with a generous hand gesture displaying his wedding ring, he says: “Austria for Austrians. Because of you." He calls to list him, "the original". Something that, altogether, made me think of Walter Benjamin's idea of aura.


An experiment started at CERN, inside a 27 kilometer tunnel bellow Switzerland and France, where very ephimeral supersymetric –antimatter– particles are expected to come out as a result of collision between two beams of protons, and other heavy things, traveling against one another almost at the speed of light, at a temperature of almost absolute zero degree. In mass media, it is called the most important-ever scientific and international experiment in history. There is this unlikely possibility, like one in three hundred thousand, that a black hole is formed, a very small and and short-living one.

I transported the ball to Pao’s, where we watched the Austria-Lithuania game, 2-0 for Lithuania.

09.09.2008

I placed the ball at some spots in galleries.

08.09.2008

To do’s:
-An interview with someone from the Anthropology department at Vienna University who’s doing research about latinamerican artists.
-A meeting with someone who’s planning a collective exhibition on art and migration.
-Maybe get in contact with someone who's doing a "cualitative survey" on art and migration.

Last night, A and I walked along the Kanal passing the ball to each other. She seemed to like the idea of a work of art you can touch and boot around. I guess it’s also nice if you’ve been earning money as an "art slave", taking care people don’t get too close to the stuff inside museums.

07.09.2008

I took the artwork to Pao’s new flat at 18th district. On the area, there are basically turks and old people. As we drank coffee we talked about a friend of hers, who was arrested at the Istambul airport for three days, for some mis-information regarding his visa. While talking about it, Vale showed me her bottle cap collection: a nice and clean set of flags from different countries that engaged in the euro2008 football match. She had Israel, Spain, Cote d’Ivoir, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Scotland, and Portugal.

06.09.2008

I rolled my artwork from Türkenstraße to Pickwick’s, an English café by Schwedenplatz. On the way I remembered how girl's weren't allowed to play football at school. This seems also a border implied in this project, in the sense of borders defining fixed identities.

At evening I took it to Altes AKH, where I met with K, Christina, and some others. Our conversation eventually slided into Austrian elections –coming soon– as it often happens when languaje or migration pops up as a theme in Austria these days.

Then the ball gave place to a conversation about the difference between patriotism and nationalism, that arose from the starting point of football fanatism. In Mexico nationalism a connotation that is regarded as positive, with children honoring the flag and chanting the national hymn every monday 8 o’clock. I guess this kind of militaristic ceremonies would rather be warning sign around here.

Austria beat France 3:1.

05.09.2008

I aquired my artwork at a sports shop behind Westbanhoff in Vienna. The guy from the shop asked me about the concept and gave me some good consulting. Together, we went through the catalog and figured out the meaning of different balls, starting with the “retro” style of the classic football that was used in Mexico 1970. Finally, I chose the euro2008 model. Not bad. It took place right here where my project begins. Besides, it is beautiful; not that beauty is a necessary quality of art, but in this case it’s a plus point. While it has the hexagons structure introduced in Mexico’s match, it has a nice, contemporary design that gives it a strong visual presence. This design was seen by millions this year around the globe. The guy wished me good fun. It costed 24,99 euro, and was handed to me in a nice red bag that said “Lebe deinen Sport!”

This artwork fills the whole space. As it occupies the entire gallery, I don’t think I should need to show anything else.

04.09.2008.

I was invited to make a work on migration. Later I talked to M about my idea. M is a girl from Poland who’s getting a master’s degree at home and cleaning people’s houses in Vienna. While talking to her I realized the project had also something to do with borders.