time is an animal | marit mihklepp

gatherings in sacred places, slowly revealing themselves to the ones returning and paying attention

Walking, breathing, noticing and resting with the beings and landscapes of Pianpicollo Selvatico became my practice during the residency. I was returning to the same places, letting myself be carried by the encounters between the inner and outer weathers, learning the language of following the lines of bright yellow, the mud paintings on the trees, sunshine illuminating certain stones. In times of grief - ecology is personal - artistic research needs to be intimate, softly noticing the subtle changes in the texture between the individual self and its surroundings. 

Winter diary

February 1, 2024

We arrive quite late. We start driving from Cambiano, when it is already dark. I yawn myself awake couple of times in the car. Serpentine roads, talks about Mexico, feathered serpents and feng shui. When we finally arrive to Pianpicollo, we are greeted by an ocean of stars above. I recognise Cassiopeia, named after the vain and boastful queen in Greek mythology. This constellation makes a W or M in the sky, when you connect the 5 brightest stars in the constellation. Alice and Carla welcome us with warm meal and even warmer embraces. Aramis, my ginger cat friend, comes to say hi as well. It feels good to be back after my brief visit last September.

Agnes Martin book catches my attention, I open it and find two sentences to carry in my pockets:

„Beauty is the mystery of life.“

„Happiness is being on the beam with life – to feel the pull of life.“

I take my first solitary walk, just wandering around, as I enjoy the most. I heard green-backed tits, saw some yellow blossoms, lots of grasses and dried wild carrots. I greet the mountains, who hold behind them some warm sunlight. These mountain stones I already recognise, their lines and eroded patterns, being full of themselves in the most grounded way. As they rest on the ground, I lie next to them.

Later I follow one white chicken. Perhaps it becomes my thing, following the rhythms of the animals here. When I return to my room, it is full of winged ants. One corner of my room has become a mini-volcano, spitting out crowds of ants. I take half an hour to get all of them outside.

We make a fire, just before the sunset, near the sacred oak and spring. Pianpicollo welcomes me fully. One blackbird sings. We then wheelbarrow the living fire back home.

I learn one Italian word: grano saraceno. A piece of obsidian and a white stone, given to me by Andrea, have filled the room with their silence. Bergamotto, also given by Andrea, has filled my room with its heavenly smell.

It feels it has already been a week.

February 4, 2024

This morning greets me with full sunshine. I follow Carla, who is bringing the horses and the donkeys to their pasture. I have a little special moment with the younger donkey Zefira – she is curious about the new being in their herd.

I am lying on my belly on the Vitalba Deck with full sun and birds speaking in all kinds of tongues and songs.

We make lemon-almond biscotti with Carla. Almond milk and sunflower oil are creating galaxies in the bowl. Carla tells me that Pianpicollo will show me what I need. I definitely need these cookies.

February 5, 2024

There is sun and strong wind today, which is singing through the curves of the landscapes here. I spend some time with the old stone wall, these rocks are much older than the wall, of course. I lose myself into the extremely delicate patterns of different lichen, passionately biting on the stone. It´s possible that they inspired the ancient cave paintings. There is always life on stones, in stones. Everything happens, even without pushing or pulling, especially without pushing or pulling. I am being held here, softly, with attention.

An afternoon of unweeding the lavender field, and I am the slowest in this work. I admire the roots and resilience of different plants, I bath in the sweet smell of soil. It´s difficult to see where one plant ends and another one begins. We could learn this way of relating to one another. The „being-weed“ depends on the perspective.

Dorodango making is il disastro.

February 6, 2024

Today it´s cloudy. I go out to take my daily view picture and a sentence came to me - I go out to search for something and then the air dissolves that idea and offers me something I really need.

I feel good here in Pianpicollo, I don´t even remember when was the last time I felt like this. Carla tells me that it´s the RADICE, the root. I understand that I can find my roots and rooting almost anywhere, and that roots also have a future, not only the past.

Alice takes us to follow the mud. Now it has become all about roots and mud.

February 7, 2024

It feels as the words disappear like the clouds here in the mountains disperse and only some movements remain. Space, pause, breath. Something that does not have the weight of all the meanings, yet means even more because of that lightness. I hope to create spaces like that one day.

Yesterday I realised how lucky I am here – held by the landscape, these marvellous animals and these inspiring women. Aramis comes to my door, he sits on my lap and together we listen to the calm silence of the afternoon.

I never come back from a walk with empty hands. Today I go to the mud alone. I spend a long time with the roots, trees, moss and all the other bodies and timings. Landslide has made visible the slow processes of the underground. I receive a love letter from Pianpicollo, in the form of a mud painting on a tree – it looks like patterns of little plants. I feel a sense of calm I don´t remember having felt elsewhere.

February 11, 2024

Morning came with a thick fog, which slowly breathed itself out behind the mountains.

In the afternoon I was led to a bright yellow fungus, almost like in a dream. It felt like another love letter from Pianpicollo. We are in a conversation from the first day. Tremella mesenterica – witches´ butter, yellow brain, golden jelly fungus, yellow trembler, kollane kõhrik. How to make walking, revisiting certain landscapes and these subjectively significant encounters my art practice, something to take seriously as well as to bring joy to others?

In the evening I took a different walking path, uphill from the farm. The light behaves different there, in between these high trees and wide open skies. There were peculiar cloud formations, which reminded me of the spectacular heavenly patterns I had been witnessing throughout the whole last year, when I was barely touching the earth and did my best to avoid all possible human interaction.

Pianpicollo is truly a rescue/recovery residency. Everything here shows how well I can be, or what balanced Marit feels like. I am so much calmer and I worry less. I am here to meet myself, and start drawing and writing and walking again and again.

I brought home two stones.

„The attitude I take is that everyday life is more interesting than forms of celebration, when we become aware of it. That when is when our intentions go down to zero. Then suddenly you notice that the world is magical.“ (John Cage)