Archive Event VII - Honeycombing
19 January – 21 January 2023

For the seventh edition of the Archive Series, Looiersgracht 60 is pleased to present Honeycombing, a dual presentation from artists Elena Khurtova and Marie Ilse Bourlanges. In archival terminologies, the term ‘honeycombing’ refers to a technique of leaving open spaces in storage shelving to allow for additions to existing collections. Honeycombing is Khurtova’s and Bourlanges’ second presentation at Looiersgracht 60; in 2019 they co-developed Archive Event II, entitled Shelf-life, a one-day performance that paid special attention to the ‘afterlife of archives’, challenging changes to endure time and instead embracing their living potential.

Now over 3 years later we are pleased to welcome them both back as they present two distinct projects, Mother’s Milk and Displace, created by each artist autonomously but both drawing from years of close collaboration and dialogue.

In 2020 Bourlanges and Khurtova held a residency at 3bisF Contemporary Art Centre in Aix-en-Provence, FR which is located in a former isolation pavilion for women at the Montperrin psychiatric hospital. During their time in residence, Khurtova and Bourlanges researched two distinct archival practices. Looking at ‘grondbanken’ as physical archives of displaced soil, Elena Khurtova investigates the notions of care vs. control, both in the context of soil management and psychiatric institutions. Questioning the ability of institutions to remember, Marie Ilse Bourlanges explores parallels between the destruction of medical archives and the necessary mechanisms of physiological forgetting.

Their research while in residence resulted in several installations, performances and two distinct artist publications. Archive Event VII 'Honeycombing' is organized around the launch of these two books, published by Jap Sam Books, alongside the works, research and conversations that have accompanied them.

Mother’s Milk, Marie Ilse Bourlanges

Mother’s Milk (re)constructs the story of Ilse, the author’s grandmother. Alienated in the psychiatric hospital of La Timone, in Marseille, Ilse resided there from 1952 until her death in 1983. In Mother’s Milk, Bourlanges brings together archival material, correspondences and conversations narrated via documentary poetry. An undertow of embodied memory meets the flow of institutional remembrance, drawing parallels between the discarded material of archives and the necessary mechanisms of physiological forgetting. Mother’s Milk offers an intimate journey into madness, intergenerational trauma transmission and the role of artistic research in imagining a possibility of healing. Mother’s Milk is designed by Alix Chauvet in close collaboration with the artist, with an introduction text by Marta Pagliuca Pelacani. For Honeycombing, Marie Ilse Bourlanges has developed a text-based performance with excerpts of Mother’s Milk and inspired by EMDR, a form of therapy to treat post traumatic stress disorder.

Displace, Elena Khurtova

Displace explores the process of entering into a dialogue with soil as a living entity and offers an intimate insight into Elena Khurtova’s research, process, and personal connection with displaced soils. Mediating with excavated soil management terrains in Aix-en-Provence in the South of France, Elena Khurtova welcomed 45 tonnes of displaced soil in the garden of 3bisF. With essays by writer Amelia Groom and the artist, Displace addresses the materiality of soil through an interplay of imagery, text and tactility. Elena Khurtova and graphic designer Tariq Heijboer have applied these very soils as pigments in a duo-color offset print resulting in an artist book that represents the artistic process of collaborating with soil.

PROGRAMME

Mother’s Milk

Thursday January 19

18.00 – 20.00 (17.30 doors open)

18:15- 18:45 Performance

19:00 - 19:30 Talk

Performance and book launch of Mother’s Milk, Marie Ilse Bourlanges

The performance will be followed by a discussion between the artist, Marta Pagliuca Pelacani (artistic researcher and editor) and Alix Chauvet (graphic designer).

Displace

Saturday 21 January

15.00 - 17.00

Book launch Displace, Elena Khurtova

A reading of essay contribution Longer thoughts than mind can have by Amelia Groom, followed by a discussion between the artist, researcher and curator Maddie Rose Hills and graphic designer Tariq Heijboer.

The installations can be viewed from Thursday 19 January until Saturday 21 January, each day from 12:00 - 20:00. During the events publisher Jap Sam will be present to sell books. Admission is free. If you would like to attend one or both of the events on Jan 19 or 21, please RSVP to info@looiersgracht60.org and indicate which event you would like to attend.