Herri is out! Final product of the Decay without mourning

After an inspiring conference in Stellenbosch, Decay project has published its final product, a beautiful special issue of Herri, with many interesting pieces from project members and conference guests alike. WAMUWI MBAO’s report from the conference is an informative summary.

Herri is an online audiovisual journal that allows for publishing visual and multimedia art together with research papers, and it allows multilingual publishing, which is why we thought it was excellent for the project. I published a triptych on my Antarctic work, even though I had presented the Japanese case at the conference. The entire issue is very beautiful, except for my contribution, which I am really not happy with, because half of it is hidden and hard to find.

Don’t miss pressing on the text FILM and POEM, because these are two important parts of the triptych, an audiovisual artwork “tropical dinner” with the mesmerising singing of Inger, and a fresh poem on Antarctic heritage. The problem is, unless you know, it would never occur to you to click on these words, since the entire issue is laid out differently.

New project!

Once again great news around here: Lize-Marié van de Watt, Lizabé Lambrechts and others, including myself have been awarded a new grant, Decay without mourning: Future-thinking heritage practices. The grant was received in the joint call Global Issues - Integrating Different Perspectives on Heritage and Change by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, together with Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo and Volkswagen Foundation. Altogether only eight projects with the total of 11 million of Euros was granted in this extremely competitive international call, and our share is € 1 437 200. For me it means some exciting work both with Japan and Antarctica, trying to work with heritage practices that embrace change and decay instead of unachievable permanence. The project will run between 2022 and 2025. Initially planned preparatory workshop in South Africa had to be cancelled for the obvious reasons, but hopefully the four years are long enough for the travel bans to be lifted, so that I can both do my field work and meet the other participants.

More can be read from here

Japanese traditional heritage practices offer many examples of decay and mending as a process that adds value to the item, instead of reducing the value.

On the picture: Traditional and modern (Macroflex!) mending techniques of hitsugi trees at Fuji Yoshida Shrine, Japan. The site is part of the Fuji-san world heritage site. Photo taken in 2016.