Author: gertrud

Refugee Community Mosaic

Today is international women’s day. I want to remember an amazing project for international women’s day 2015 that I consider myself lucky to have been part off. The women4women production inspired and directed by Miriam Engstrom is a project that gives women a chance to express themselves in an event through visual and performing art. The project is set up in a way to encourage women that have never done such thing before to participate in theatre and music performance and an exhibition . By coincidence Miriam and I lived for some time together in the same neighborhood in Ankara. We had a kind of regular morning walk habit in our local park together and during this  I was expressing my dream of creating a community mosaic to Miriam.  We were speaking about the fact that mosaic making requires a lot of time and that refugees have a lot of time as they are often waiting for years for their applications to be administered and during that time are often not allowed to work officially. So we came …

THE AYVALIK MOSAIC – finally in Ayvalik – first week

We made it! The mosaic parts and me have arrived safe in Ayvalik. All went well. The only tricky situation during the trip was when I arrived in Istanbul and the costums officer asked me to open my suitcases. Oh I was sweating! They brought an extra art specialist to look at the mosaic but he immediately recognized it as new. I was sweating not only because I feared they would confiscate it but also because I had to open the elaborate packaging – it took me over half an hour to close it again.  Which was  then lovingly handled by our friend Ümit who picked me up  in his red car at Istanbul airport and together with his wife hosted me for one beautiful day in the city by the Bosphorus. On Monday night I arrived in Ayvalik. Tulya my dear friend fetched me at the bus stop in the middle of the night with my super heavy suitcases. It is so nice to be back and feel soo at home at her house. …

THE AYVALIK MOSAIC – Brasilia Mosaic Moments Studio 6th week

I am writing this blog at 2 am at Sao Paolo airport waiting for my flight to Istanbul depart in  2 hours. The mosaic parts are in my two suitcases which are weighing  almost 50kg. Luckily I did not have to pay excess luggage . The check in personnel had a good day. Its nice to stay awake at such odd hours because I really want to tell  you about this exciting last week. On Tuesday I set the last stone. Already when finishing the last figure I felt a slight feeling of procrastination. As much as I do want this project to come to completion as much I dread to let it go. Its my life since almost a year. And I also grouted the wave mosaic with dark grey grout. I actually only had light grey so I mixed some black pigment in it.  I hope it will not harm the quality of the tile grout. On Wednesday my daughter Louise helped me to tidy up the studio and arrange the mosaics for …