FINALLY …
Nikolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig – chablone street art by artist unknown, summer 2014 Berlin
SCHWARM IMPRESSIONS
…HERE A GLOWING REPORT FROM THE BERNER KULTURAGENDA…
…AND HERE ANOTHER REPORT FROM THE BERNER ZEITUNG !…
FOTOS BY MARK ANGELO HARRISON
THE BIGGEST ELEPHANT IN SWITZERLAND EVER!
DAY 3
Go Go! Bang Bang! Stine Lawines Gogo Trash costumes and accessoires workshop kicked off the first day of scheduled events at the Bern Reitschule , upcycling your everday plastic waste into strassehaut couture. Representing Berlin homeless peoples association “Unter Druck – Kultur von der Straße e.V.” the Klang Kunst Jekami session began here, as at home, every Wednesday at 16:00. Traditional instruments such as Hurdy Gurdy , fiddle and guitar organically fuse via live sampling, with keyboard, lo-fi electronic machines and of course the Khaos pad!
The football world cup rages all around except in the Schwarmscape where the game here is to create and disseminate. But wait! Whats this? ..a band of Argentinians secretly watching the football in the middle of this You-topia? The dolphin-shark hybrid is painted with saucy nautical tatoos and raises a huge wooden dorsal fin towards the Riding Hall roof. Come one come all! – Get a genuine old school foto taken of yourself and prove to your friends that you were here! Thats happening right now until Sunday! live and analogue from Kreuberg Berlin, the one and the only Djangos Flying Portraits!! Meanwhile, the Grejpfrut kollective arrive from Metelkovo squat, Ljubljana and begin to create the biggest artificial elephant that has ever been seen in Switzerland!
GREJPFRUT “WE WILL BUILD THE BIGGEST ELEPAHNT THAT HAS EVER BEEN SEEN IN SWITZERLAND”
IN PROCESS….
DAY 2
Witness the swarm effect! New faces, both Swiss and international, join the creative process.Another few tons of wooden pallets are delivered, and are quickly cannabilised and absorbed into the wood and paper swarm-scape. Power tools are stretched to their limits in the race to create. The dream machine is already activated in its living room laboratory environment,other installations and temporary autonomous zones start to define themselves out of the material chaos.
LASSEN UNS SCHWARMIEREN!
DAY 1
Monday 7th July 2014 and the the first day of activities begin with a collective collective shout out to the multiverse to Swarm to Bern, Switzerland.
The day begins at 10:00 a.m. sharp and theres a group of around twenty people assembled in the large riding hall attached to the Reitschule autonomous center in Bern. First we truck and carry in a couple of tons of wood in the form of pallets, reanimated old stage props and various elements saved from the brink of burning.
Within an hour the raw materials, mainly wood, cardboard and paint, are in the space, meanwhile the kitchen that will serve us all throughout the coming week has been set up so we eat breakfast and talk.
There are some informal introductions, Domo from La Drucki welcomes everyone and then, with a laugh, begins to tell us what is NOT possible over the coming festival days, that we are all collectively responsible for the general safety and security as well as the opening and closing of the public spaces .
– Every day at 19uhr “Vokü” (Peoples Kitchen) Various groups taking part in the festival have already volunteered and have been assigned on different days to cook.
– Midday Freestyle Buffet -the basic survival foodstuffs will be provided and people are invited to “Jekami” (Everyone can join in) to make spontaneus donations and/or cook.
– The Reitschule is a sprawling complex of buildings with a highly developed infrastructure; the woodwork atelier; the restaurant and the Dachstock venue amongst others offer technical and logistical support.
– We go around the circle , people talk about their ideas, we work out roughly where the different attractions and inter-actions will be best distributed throughout the Riding Hall. The consensus is to construct most of the installations so that they are mobile and can be moved in , out and around the Reitschule complex and finally out into the city itself. Amongst this ever expanding and self replicating Schwarm Organism, a “Love Tank” is planned, a huge “Elephant in the Room” ; an over dimensional “Bee Swarm” a “Skill Sharing Stage” and a Brion Gysin inspired, “Dream Machine”.
Let the Swarm begin! (FOTOS FROM TODAY)
GRUNDTVIG SKILL SHARING PLAKART SCHWARMFEST , REITSCHULE BERN JULY 2014
GRUNDTVIG SKILL SHARING PLAKART SCHWARMFEST , REITSCHULE BERN JULY 2014
GET READY!
Preparation Meetings for Grundtvig – inspired
Summer Festival at Bern Reithalle 7-15 July 2014
SECURITY CAT CHECKING IDS AT THE DENK:MAL ENTRY + GRUNDTVIG PROPAGANDA BY MAD COW
There has been a lot of water under the bridge since writing the first draft of this blog entry and the publishing of it (today!). Since January, there have been three Schwarm Festival preparatory meetings in Bern plus two meetings in Berlin , the first with SP23 on 03.05.14 , combining a Grundtvig update meeting plus combining our efforts to make an audio visual print support action for the Berlin, Kreuzberg kreuzdorf wagenburg project. Urs/Reitschule also visited Berlin Czentrifuga on 22.05.14 for a small coordination meeting also together with Stephan Kruhl / Kulturpark 3000 as well as making pre Schwarm propaganda printing action ( this and this )
To backtrack to the first meeting; Kollektiv Druckerei Reitschule initiated the first round of discussions for this planned Grundtvig Skill Sharing Network end-festival in the large (ex) Riding Hall , part of the squatted Reitschule complex in the Swiss Capital Bern. Heres the original PDF invite in German einladung_mail. The initial Schwarm preparatory meeting (and all subsequent Bern meetings) take place at denk:mal which is a squatted autonomus school project in an unused 3 story block of apartments situated in the traditionally open minded area of Lorraine. The school offers a lot of workshop possibilities and specialises in language courses in Russian, Spanish, Arabic, German, Women exclusive, Turkish and “Spielen Deutsch” (learn in a playfull way)
The main ideas behind the event – an Open Source D.I.Y. Happening: a “Swarm” ten day event for Art and Politic in the Swiss Capital , Bern from 7.July until 16.Juli 2014. A chance for networking and free flowing knowledge exchange, collectively and creatively building up the space , looking at the themes of free access to the city and dissolving borders. The atmospehere in Bern was charged at the time of the first meeting due to an upcoming citizens referendum (Zuwanderungsabstimmung) on the theme of allowing refugees in the country)
Only the coordinating partner Czentrifuga could attend the scheduled two days of meetings , so we arranged a Skype conference with the other partners on the second meeting at denk:mal Flo from Kollektive Druckerei Reitschule introduced our Grundtvig partnership to the other Swiss collectives and individuals attending the meeting. Both meetings were accompanied by food which was prepared on a portable gas stove on the outside balcony from the meeting room. Also attending this first meeting on the 17th were Bblackboxx (LINK) from Basel which is an antiracist activist art space specialising in refugee issues. Not at this actual meeting but pledging support were Ameise Free System (soundsystem Bern), TH3 (screenprint art collective/Geneva) and le dernier cri (screenprint and art organisation/Marseille)
A smaller meeting on the the following day for members from the Reitschule Druckerei and Czentrifuga together with Kulturpark 3000, SP23 and SWM as virtual Skype attendees gave an opportunity to look at the Grundtvig partnership. We discussed the project administration, including the upcoming work on the final report. That evening we attended Tour de Lorraine, a yearly event which networks the neighbourhood, projects, shops, clubs, bars, galleries etc . to raise money for socio- cultural activities (post script: Reitschule Druckerei has since achieved to receive some of this money in support of the Schwarm Festival!)
LEARN GERMAN THE PLAYFULL WAY AT DENK:MAL + BERN TO POLAND ARE U RECEIVING US?
Reitschule Druckerei introducud us to the Schwarm-specific Wiki and the technicalities of how to use it to handle the various upcoming logistical issues that present themselves before such a large (free!) public event – a common platform for Grundtvig partners and others to collect various vital infos. The last day of the programme was a trip out to the countryside, complete with snow, fresh air and spectacular views of mountain peaks. Here, in list form, some of the the main points collected from the three days of formal and informal discussions
– Luki from the Reitschule Druckerei gave the examples of City of Names and Extreme Painting – two previous, sucessfull Berlin events as model ideas for our end of project manifestation.
− Shadow Drawing. As demonstrated by SWM at the last Grundtvig Skill Sharers meet in Bern. we could use the massive riding hall space to create large scale anlogue visual effects…
− SP 23 Live music and VJ / DJ support for the Saturday night end party. Hanging the art backdrops we produced collectively at the last Grundtvig Marseille meeting.
− SP 23 Abelton software workshop
− Send out the message and begin collecting raw materials such as plastic cardboard wood material (stoff) . people can also store stuff at their homes etc
− Mobile Siebdruck Van. often used at Czentrifuga events, Anefs converted old French bus could drive from Berlin and directly drive into the space , ready for making workshops such as her Zinedays project (collective screenprint magazine)
− Gogotrash recycled plastic costumes workshop with Stine fromCzentrifuga
− Tom Kino (visual support from Reitschule)
− Black Box. an isolated small box/booth fitted with audio video recording and broadcasting equipment.
– list of sympathetic places in Bern to help with food and accomodation for visitors e.g. Sleeper / Dead end Bar across from Reitschule, Mutanstrasse, ex Squat in Bethelehem area , who volunteer to cook for one day and offer sleeping places as well as camping possibility.
− Reithalle has 18 sleeping places (Kuenstler Asyl Hotel ?)
− Frauen Raum Reitschule / 10 sleeping places
− invite Reclaim your City Berlin
− Moveable sculptures and installations for possible relocation around the Reitschule and also in the city (product placement) . there will be a lot of people by the river whom we could also attract..
− end auction of artworks produced during the festival
− construct rooms within a room
− video mapping and projection
− podest elements for klein buhne
− Barrier free – everyone is invited to join in with the development process as well as the actual event wekend.
− comics
− maison autogere
− self made instruments workshops (everyone make big noise) DIY stummfilm vertonung
− small live acts , noise, ambient drone, poetry. performance ….a big band set up with drum kit is too much work and sounds bad in the halle
− Czentrifuga would present Bank of Czentrifuga Forces – “First Institute for Self Made Money “… performance installation with a bank, safe and money washing machine plus the chance to make designs and print your own money. Has been in existence for several years now. possible lecture and discussion about money and project presentation.
− Katrin Czentrifuga ..Tag Tool workshop for kids and adults
− Urs …skate park
− Domma ..Projection
− film research ..”Das Boot ist nicht Voll” (about refugee issue in Switzerland)
− rutschbahn mit katapult
− Tomek Grundtiv/ SWM fibreglass constructions
− DIY furniture Workshops pallet chairs etc..
− sticker workshop
D.I.Y. Skill Sharing Network 
