TRAVELLING JOURNEYMAN

Concept of the journey:
... Or why I chose to leave my ordinary life behind, to backpack around the world and to reach for the MoMA. I gave up my nice apartment and the jobs, got rid of the burdens and threw away the unnecessary.
Being a young artist with a completed education, but still not able to earn a living from art, I asked myself: What comes next? Which paths and goals do I pursue?
The given models of subsistence, such as scholarships or part-time jobs, cannot be the permanent solution. They remain inconsistent and demand time and energy, which I rather want to dedicate to my art.
For many years I have embarked on different journeys: to the far North of Scandinavia, on the route of Santiago de Compostela, through the immense widths of Mongolia on horseback. I climb mountains, explore forests and cross deserts. I learn about different cultures and about my own at the same time. The impressions and experiences of my journeys are elaborated in my art – often the journey becomes the art itself. Therefore, I will set off again: three steps back, to get five steps forward hopefully. I want to travel around the world, with a backpack containing only what I can carry, and work as assistant for renowned artists, or such that are inspiring for my work. Briefly: I am on the road.
The goal of this journey is to stay in one place and with one artist for a maximum time of two weeks and gather new experiences for artistic concepts. I am hoping for an intense exchange with the artists, discussions about their works and new perspectives on art. Through the contacts I will widen my network on the one hand, and on the other I will continue a discourse about my own work, leading to a definition and deeper under- standing of it. Furthermore, I want to ask every artist to design a page in my “journeys and artists-book.” The artist decides whether to support me financially at all, on which the continuation of this project obviously depends and if yes, on the amount.
Between one station and the other I will experience life “one the road,” travel to remote regions, walk through national parks and explore the big cities of the world.
The focus of my artistic research lies on the departure, the setting off for unknown paths and leaving the
old behind. But it also deals with the questioning of structures (both society’s and mine), with letting go and looking ahead, with challenges that make me grow and that offer alternatives to conventional patterns. The journey comes before the destination.
Thus the incentive is the journey itself, which may last many months or years. My experiences and observations will be reflected in my artistic work. The journey alone becomes the work, a documentation of my encounters and the work with the artists.
If this road will lead to the temple of international art, remains to be seen.

Among the artists I stayed with from March 2011 to January 2012 were (selection):
Zeger Reyers, Gerda Steiner & Jörg Lenzlinger, Art Basel, Marcel Odenbach, Werner Pokorny, Christoph Draeger & Heidrun Holzfeind, Biennale Venedig, Jorinde Voigt & Christian Jankowski, Pipilotti Rist, Trussardi Fundation.