The Land of The King of Winds (You never know where the wind will take you)

Through this psychoanalytic journey I intended to analyse and become more aware of my unconscious. In a way I did, because I realised that I, in no way, will actually and truly, handle the idea of death and mourning. Although during the making of the artwork in Ogygia I became more personal, during the making of the artwork in Telepylos I made myself think of the idea of loss in a symbolic way, but did not in the slightest make myself go through a process of catharsis, nor relate to it at any point. I had difficulties engaging with the process. Firstly because ever since the pandemic started I have tried to shut out of my mind anything that can bring me down and I usually fail, but this I could shut out of my mind. So instead, I went through a different journey of realisation. I always loved psychology and analysis of the mind and behaviour and I enjoy the process, but it has to be an organic process that will take much more time than this placement, and I will continue through this process in the future. Therefore, I will name this project, the beginning of a whole new way of living. The reflection of myself, as I am now, not ready to deal with almost anything.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Odyssey psychoanalysis

I want to include the meaning of Odyssey and all elaborations of the places mentioned in the Odyssey associated to each post, separately to encourage the viewers to make their own assumptions about the meaning of each part of the project before (and if ever) reading the symbolism that I have given to each place and how it is driven from the actual ancient greek myth written by Homer following the adventure of a war hero Odysseus as he tries to get back to his homeland and family in Ithaka island. I use this story as a parallel to my own psychoanalytic journey, linking the moral meaning of each stop in Odyssey, to my own practice.

Ithaka

As you set out for Ithaka
hope the voyage is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope the voyage is a long one.
May there be many a summer morning when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you come into harbors seen for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind—
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars.

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you are destined for.
But do not hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you are old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you will have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.

Konstantinos Kavafis

I included this poem written in 1911 by Kavafis because it summarises the ideas behind my project. I want to use this project to express and understand my feeling better, as a way of psychoanalysis through art. As Odysseus, I have set out on a journey, not knowing where the wind will take me, and the importance of this journey is not the destination but the process of getting there because there is nothing else to get from an achieved goal, than the lessons in the process.

Ogygia

Calypso was a nymph that lived in the magic island, Ogygia. Odysseus got to the island by himself after all his shipmates died at sea in a shipwreck. He stayed in the island for some years but he would always look into the sea and wish to go back to his homeland. After 7 years, Zeus sent Hermes to tell Calypso to help Odysseus build a boat so he can leave. Calypso tried to bribe Odysseus to stay by promising to make him immortal, but Odysseus set sail to Ithaka, remembering his “red balloons”.

Telepilos

The land of Laestrygonians was the place where Odysseus tribe was suppose to meet, but Laestrygonians were man-eater giants that wrecked the 11 out of the 12 ships of the tribe, making him and his men the only survivors, as the rest either drowned or got eaten by the giants. That feeling that I describe in the project, is like the Laestrygonians; it can eat you alive or drown you into your depression.

Land of the Laestrygonians

Freud and Pandemic, Art and Mourning, Mourning and Melancholia: life in the face of loss and PROJECTIONS: Death Drive on Film

In the past weeks, I had to read a lot about the pandemic and the  restrictions due to covi-19, which influenced me to read about it as displayed through the exhibition prevue Freud and Pandemic. It presents the state of the Freud family in the duration of the pandemic. After the passing of Freud’s pregnant daughter, Freud wrote his theory on life drive and death drive which immediately drew my attention. I continued by listening to a Symposium and a podcast about mourning; Art and Mourning and Mourning and Melancholia: life in the face of loss which helped in the making of the following artworks.

I started by thinking of how the pandemic has influenced my life. I get anxious that time flies and it’s slipping through my fingers. On the one hand, I persistently try to make each second last and be felt, but on the other hand I am waiting for another day to pass, to take me closer to the end of the pandemic, only to then be anxious about all the time I left flew by.

While I am self isolating, I have to work only with any materials I find in the house. For the artworks, I used a piece of cloth, that I bought to make a cover of a book, a year ago, that I never actually made, some bubble wrap that my brother had left after moving, technology and the natural light coming through the windows. Three aspects of time passing and death are unfolded through three separate artworks.

The shimmering light of life that covers death

In the exhibition prevue PROJECTIONS: Death Drive on Film a quote drew my attention;

Unbeing dead isn’t being alive.

Inspired by this quote I made an installation piece which I then used to make a time-lapse video capturing the passing of time reflected on the way the light hits the bubble wrap. The matte fabric represents the “unbeing alive”.

Still photo of the installation “The shimmering light of life that covers death”

For me that means that we are so focus on the fact that we are alive and breathing, feeling safe in the false certainty that we will stay alive for long enough to live that in the end we don’t.

Download and watch video here: Time-lapse video 1

Death is inevitable, but the way that I see it, while it approaches one would start thinking of everything that is not achieved, everything that is not experienced and suddenly all the time wasted sleeping, eating, reading, relaxing, while needed and enjoyed in the process, seems unnecessary and  poorly spent. At least that’s how it feels it will be…