Mama and I. Sep 2008
MAMA’S GARDEN: WORDS OF LOVE
Mama loves flowers. Thinking about it now, she has loved flowers as far I as I can remember. Having her garden with beautiful flowers and plants is mama’s dream. Her working space is full of flowers and plants maintained by her. Contrary to this fact, I don’t know anything about flowers or plants let alone their maintenance. Mama and I used to spend long summer evenings sitting outside of our house talking about making our backyard into a garden. Since my relocation to the UK, she has planted two trees (you have already guessed, I don’t know the type of the trees) in the backyard: one for me and another for my older brother. Now the trees have grown bigger than us.
An adult expressing love for his/her living parents and grandparents is very common tradition in Mongolia; there are countless songs, poems and art works dedicated exclusively to parents and grandparents. From what I know of British modern culture, it is rare that adults sing songs or create artworks about their parents. Perhaps, it is too childish, or too basic or overly subjective for some people. So far, I have seen only two significant art works about parents and grandparents. The first piece was Yoko Ono’s ‘My Mommy Was Beautiful’ installation (Liverpool Biennale, 2004), where she reproduced her ‘Mommy Was Beautiful’ (1997) colour photographic series into flyers, postcards, posters and badges and spread them all over Liverpool. She chose two images, a woman’s breast and pubic area. It was again, Yoko’s signature participatory piece where the public were the creators and they asked to write something about their mums on a wall in an exhibition space. The second artwork was Darren Almond’s ‘If I Had You’ (2003) a four screen video installation displayed at the Turner Prize 2005 exhibition, in which he explored his widowed grandmother’s intimate memories about love and loss. In a darkened space, multiple large scale projections showed: an elderly woman in a deep contemplation about her long gone husband, a water fountain among a garden full of colourful flowers, an image of an illuminated windmill and footsteps of a couple ballroom dancing.
I want to create my interpretation of a garden for my mama. It will be a temporary and site specific installation piece focusing on mother’s love.
The piece will be displayed in a fully accessible public space. It will consist of the garden created from man-made materials and real flowers. Mama’s handwritten letters will be placed inside plastic frames placed around the space. One of the letters will be translated in English, recorded and played. I will perform as a hostess of the event and welcome people into the garden and offer a cup of tea and biscuits in English style. People can sit down on benches and relax. I will ask people to write something about their mums in reaction to the piece. Their writings will be placed inside the plastic frames and hung along with my mum’s letters. The garden will be open for 7 (?) days and the final result will be a blend of words, emotions, reactions and actions.
Copyright ©2010 Tsendpurev Tsegmid
Please note: This project proposal is subject to change at anytime.
