Quarantine Emergency Call
Zoom Is Our New Rehearsal Room
On April 11, I hosted a Zoom meeting in English and again an hour later in Spanish with artists in quarantine around the globe in conjunction with Poesía sin muros. It was a chance to connect across disciplines and geographic contexts to share experiences about making, or not making, and thinking about art in quarantine. I made some notes during the call which I have consolidated here.
We find ourselves in a completely new situation. There have been stages of quarantine around the world and throughout history but this is the first time any of us can remember that we have been quarantined around the globe for such a long period of time.
We have the technology to keep collaborating together and sharing our work but haven’t had the absolute necessity of applying them till now. What we are lacking is outside stimulus and, most of us, space. Our stimulus is all coming from the internet or memory. Eres afortunada si tienes espacio para moverte.
Some of us are treating this as an enforced artistic residency, taking advantage of the extra time not spent on public transportation to make work. Others are taking a pause to think about our artistic practice and what kinds of projects we really want to make.
Many of us are learning new skills, from computer programs to new fields of study, attempting new disciplines in art, shifting our cultural consumption online, and creating new collaborations with other artists via online platforms. We have an opportunity to share work publicly, and many people are spending the days glued to their screens so we should consider taking advantage, without ego or being perfectionists.
This could be a great opportunity to begin thinking about our artistic practice in new ways. Es momento de pensar en qué se quiere, la relación con uno mismo, la relación con los demás.
We want to be conscious of the different ways in which people are experiencing life under quarantine, the workers who have been deemed “essential”, and still treated poorly. We want to start to think of ways to use new technologies and our extra time to think of ways to work on global structural issues and inequalities. We want to consider what art will look like and what role it will play in a future where these kinds of crises are more frequent. ¿Cómo podemos crear usando solo las cosas que ya tenemos en casa y solo con presentaciones en internet? ¿Cómo podemos pensar creativamente para resolver los problemas del mundo?
We also want to be conscious of the great mental shifts that happen to us during this time. We want to be gentle to ourselves, avoid putting too much pressure to create. We are in uncertain times, and taking care of our health, both physical and mental, should be prioritized.
¿Esta bien desarrollar y mantener los ritmos propios, descubrir cuales son las necesidades propias? ¿Esta bien examinar la palabra "disciplina"?. ¿Esta bien aceptar que a veces no quieres y no puedes?
*At the end of the call I put forth 3 propositions, one based on an exercise conceived by Alejandro Van Zandt-Escobar
