HRK Collective
Who we are
We are three artists: Hanne Dahl Geving, Rachel Pursglove and Karolina Rupp who met at the Arteles Creative Center, Finland in February 2020 for a one month residency programme. During that time we worked on individual projects, but the theme of the programme (Silence, Awareness, Existence) brought us together. In April 2020 we formed HRK Collective, an experimental (online) platform that allows for us to work together despite being located in different parts of Europe. Our shared walks through the Finnish countryside during the AiR program provided the starting point for our collaboration. We began by walking together although in our prospective locations, returning with impressions that we then share on this online platform.
In October 2021 we met in person for a residency period in Toffia, Italy. In March 2022, we were invited to Leveld Kunstnartun’s AiR programme.
Our practice
How is walking art, how do results or impressions of a walk come together to form something new, unpredictability, trust in the body – the two legs, the 6 legs, how six legs carry us as a collective, how we collect souvenirs from the landscape, how the landscape becomes the watcher. How we become part of a path temporarily which allows us to reinvent ourselves for a short moment – the path allowing us to take something away from it – an exchange somewhat. Walking as a form of meditation that opens up a space for being receptive to the natural world, to embrace seemingly aleatoric processes that allow for the opening of some form of lacunae of which the resonance can only be truly felt back at base-camp so to speak – when what we have left are artefacts of an experience. The soil, rocks, plants etc under our shoes, the dust on our clothes, our embodied perception in memory and our conscious recording through lens, text and sound based media for now.
Leveld Kunstnartun, March 2022
While in residence in Leveld, Norway for one month we engaged with the theme of silence in addition to our walking practice.
Inviting the community to join us for three silent activities was at the core of our collective workings. Silence is perhaps strange for most to comprehend; it’s not something that comes naturally and it may at first feel awkward, but silence allows for you to be with yourself.
Sitting/laying down in Silence, 22 Mar 2022
(Spending 40 minutes together in silence sitting or laying on the studio floor)
Walking in Silence, 19 Mar 2022
(Walking in line for a one hour silent night walk in snow-covered forest paths beginning close to the residency building)
Eating in Silence, 25 Mar 2022
(Eating dinner in silence; vegetable soup with traditional Norwegian crisp bread)
33 Officina Creativa, October 2021
During our one month residency period in Toffia, Italy we predominantly focused on the notion of togetherness through walking while experimenting with collaborative practices by making use of surrealist tools and methods, improvisation and play-inspired exercises.
Open Studios, 24 Oct 2021
(Installation in a theatre space with two sound pieces, Poem for Toffia placed on notice boards around the village)
Chapel, 16 Oct 2021
(Site-specific installation at San Donate, Toffia using yarn, fabric, wooden walking sticks, sound and found metal and organic matter)
