Thursday 25 August 2011

'My Grandparent's Tenant' by Grace Schwindt

For the past 6 weeks I have been working in the Costume department for the production of a film. It has been incredibly exhausting but also really very exciting.


We started filming on August the 20th and since then I had very very little time to take pictures, let alone sleep. Yesterday we finally finish on scene 2, and today I finally did not open my email with a tone of emails to respond to actors, director and producers; only one email came from the crew, and that was the wrap photo, with many but not all of us.


I will be heading to wales in a couple of days, so til then  I guess it will take me a little time to up load the few pics I had the chance to take, for now I leave you with the one from the crew. (by Matthew Noel-Tod) 


Click HERE to read a little about the film.





Thursday 11 August 2011

Coffee on a tuesday.

Its weird to be equally happy and sad to have written something ...   


As much as it feels nice to see my name in the index of a beautiful publication, I rather had a coffee in your garden on a tuesday...



Wednesday 3 August 2011

Tuesday 26 July 2011

and then you stop.

trying to.

what ever you were trying.

and then you wonder.

who ever was on the other side.

Friday 1 July 2011

Mara Bueno at WATERFALL MAGAZINE

If you are in BERLIN maybe you would like to swing by C/O Berlin and attend the launch of Waterfall Magazine 瀑布  Issue 4, which contains a short story I have written, hurray!! ♥

The launch will be today and tomorrow 2nd of July as part of the 'Book days Summer Festival'.

There is gonna be a few things going on, two photography exhibitions and lots of beautifully printed publication.  















Oranienburger Str 35/36 . 10117 Berlin . Germany
Fon +49 30 28 444 16 0 . info@co-berlin.com
Daily 11 am — 8 pm . Admission 10/reduced 5 Euro




Sunday 12 June 2011

Thursday 9 June 2011

...you never asked me to stay.




Strangely, this title makes me feel a little uncomfortable..  I mean, the tittle and the picture go very well together... and the picture and the title go well on this blog too.. but somehow they feel very foreign.

like they don't belong to me.

I took this picture in a Hotel in Heathrow almost a year ago. Unable to fall sleep I wandered around with my camera and uploaded some of the pictures but decided not to publish this one.

A year can be a very long time... sometimes.

Friday 6 May 2011

Distance, 68 Kilometers of Absence. (work in progress)



I am working in an Installation/urban intervention that comments on the current state of violence in Mexico. 



'Distance, 68 kilometers of Absence'


Is the physical representation of the 40000 assassinations that have taken place in Mexico since the 'war against organized crime' started 4 years ago.  From the tragedy of a number that has become an statistic, with no name, age nor gender, 68 kilometers comes from multiplying 40000 times the average height of a Mexican man, 1.70 meters. The idea of measuring this absence with distance, comes from the realization that violence in Mexico has drawn a line between my desire to come back, and that keeps growing greater. A line of distance between the place where I grew up and the one I no longer recognize. It aims to make tangible a number that is impossible to understand just by thinking about it. 

The first stage, measuring 68 metres, only 1% of the total, will be displayed as my participation in the international protest that calls for the immediate cease of violence from both, government and drug cartels. 


Demonstrations of support have already started in Mexico and will culminate on the 8th of May internationally.


Please join the demonstration in LONDON.  We will congregate at 11 am on Sunday 8th of May in front of the Mexican Embassy


Mexican Embassy,
16 St George Street,
Mayfair,
London W1S 1FD



This demand for peace and justice with no political inclination was triggered by the mexican poet Javier Sicilia, after the recent assassination of his son, and is the follow up of the first protest held the past 6th of April  which summoned 30 demonstration of support from the Mexican Civil Society around the country and 13 in different places around the world. 


Click HERE, If you want to have a look at 'the way to peace' ('Ruta por la Paz'), which shows the path that is being walked by the manifestation already taking place since the 5th of May in direction to Mexico City from Cuernavaca, Mexico. 
  
If you want to join the protest from another place in the planet, visit THIS PAGE and find your city. 


Or if can't attend but would like to join in solidarity, there is a proposal for 'Poetic Action'  that is very easy and can be done from your own house or office, all you need is an empty envelope and a stamp. HERE the easy instructions.


For the event information on facebook click HERE, and its version in SPANISH.  


The past 2 post in this blog contain additional information and links if you want to know more about what is happening in Mexico. 



Wednesday 6 April 2011

DISTANCE

I made a placard and cycled to the embassy, and there, looking at our tiny tiny group of people thought: one assassination + one assassination, makes two, and like that slowly and rapidly the number came up to 40 000. Maybe we, slowly and rapidly become enough, all of us.



It is very bizarre. I did not leave the country because of the political state it was, or the level of violence on the streets, but it is certainly now one of the main reasons that stop me from coming back. 

It is really sad to realized that your family slowly stops asking you to come back, and suddenly they even suggest not to do it. Like if they ran out of good reasons other than them missing you. 

It is very sad to have a shit life overseas and still think its potentially better than back home. I don't think I have given too much thought of how the prospect of coming back actually scares me. 

It is not only because the majority of my adult life I have lived it away, and I have less than a hand full of friends left there, or because I fear my career would have no future, what actually scares the hell out of me is that slowly slowly, the whole situation there (the corruption, the assassinations, the poverty, the many injustices), will become such and everyday thing that it will be just normalized, and become immune to it probably after a few frustrated and pitiful intents to change it. 

So I suddenly got really angry and thought, what the hell is going on?! Why am I so fearful of my country? why do I have so little hope and faith for it? why do I find it so sadly broken and decaying that I have stop trying to understand it and look away. 

I dont know how much or little I can do from here, to start regaining some of that lost hope. Specially since I had actively given up on reading the news and stay informed.

While I was outside the embassy, I started to think of the distance, between London and Mexico, between the country I used to know and the one that has become. 

Other distances have become shorter, like whit my family for example. 

I though of the consequences of those distances. 

Last week, I saw my dog being put down after an illness related to old age, on skype. It reminded me of the many things I am missing out, the ageing of my parents for example. And how somehow, that dog was to me 5 years old, like when I left almost 9 years ago, his life length has shortened.

Like the lives of those assassinated. Shortened. 

I thought 40 000, is only a number.   

I tried to imagine what it actually meant 40 000 shortened lives. Lives that have become this number, an statistic. Numbers can also mean distance. 

And thought of how long in terms of distance can a shortened life measure. 





MEXICO IN STATE OF EMERGENCY

In Mexico, there has been nearly 40 000 assassinations in the past 4 years by the so called 'war against crime'. This anonymous civilians, that have become numbers and statistics, they represent each citizen of this country, reduce to  an unprotected life, the life of an animal, of a being that can be violated, kidnapped, molested and assassinated with impunity. 


TODAY there will be 30 demonstrations around the country and 13 in different places around the world to call for the immediate end of violence from both, government and drug cartels. Please join the demonstration, in LONDON, it will be at 5pm in front of the Mexican Embassy.

Mexican Embassy,
16 St George Street,
Mayfair,
London W1S 1FD

“One day they came for the blacks, and I said nothing. Another day they came for the Jews, and I said nothing. One day they came for me (or for a son of mine) and I had nothing to say.” 

                                                                          Bertholt Brecht, when the horror of Nazism


This in an international call from the mexican poet Javier Sicilia, after the recent assassination of his son, if you want to read his letter click HERE

“Por nuestros hijos, por los que viven, por los que pueden ser víctimas mañana, por las mujeres de Juárez asesinadas, por tantos crímenes, por tantos inocentes caídos, vamos a las calles a exigirle a estos hijos de la chingada del crimen organizado que le paren, y a estos cabrones del gobierno, que respondan.”

"For our children, for the ones still alive, for the ones that could be victims tomorrow, for the women assassinated in Juarez, for the many crimes, for the many fallen innocents, lets go to the streets and demand this sons of bitches in the organized crime to stop, and the fuckers in the in the government to  respond".  

If you want information on the details of Demonstrations around the world click HERE.






Thursday 17 February 2011

Wednesday 16 February 2011

Tuesday 15 February 2011

Saturday 12 February 2011

Thursday 10 February 2011

Wednesday 9 February 2011

Tuesday 8 February 2011

Monday 7 February 2011

Sunday 6 February 2011

Thursday 3 February 2011

Wednesday 2 February 2011

Tuesday 1 February 2011

Monday 31 January 2011

Sunday 30 January 2011

Saturday 29 January 2011

Friday 28 January 2011

Thursday 27 January 2011

Wednesday 26 January 2011

Tuesday 25 January 2011

Monday 24 January 2011

Sunday 23 January 2011

Saturday 22 January 2011

Friday 21 January 2011

Thursday 20 January 2011

Wednesday 19 January 2011


julieta, happy birthday

Tuesday 18 January 2011

Monday 17 January 2011

Friday 14 January 2011

Thursday 13 January 2011

Wednesday 12 January 2011

Tuesday 11 January 2011

Monday 10 January 2011