Kuvankevät

 

We had the rehearsal yesterday. It was easier than what I expected. Elina Tuhkanen was acting as the judge and reading the text that the judge is going to read so that we can practice according to real timing of the event. I decided to have this rehearsal because the ceremony will happen only once and  it's not repeatable. So we had to plan everything carefully specially the movement of the cameras. We are using to cameras; one fix on the tripod for wide shots and the other of which is handheld will take close-ups and some shots from the audience. It's important that two camera operators coordinate smoothly and that they appear in each other's image as least as possible.

 

 

Photo by Hanne Granberg

It was the most difficult week. We got the space on 16th and had to build everything in a few days. And of course people who left the space didn't clean it at all so the first couple of days we has to clean paint from the walls and the floor. Now the set is almost ready although easter and the closed stores made a disaster out of every single thing we had to do. Tomorrow we will have a rehearsal and test shooting to see how the image looks like in that space.

Tomorrow we are going to meet the whole crew together. It's the first time we are meeting the cinematographer and I'm so worried about it. It has been so difficult to arrange a meeting with him and that gives me a bad feeling that other thing also might be difficult with him.

Arttu Merimaa made a simple but practical storyboard for the video based on the text that judge will read.

 

 

 

Next week is going to be really busy for us. The sculpture studio which is the place I will show the work in the final show should be turned into a marriage room of maistraatti in a few days. We will start shooting on Saturday.

At last we have a judge who accepted to do the work. We met her today in Käräjäoikeus. She was really nice and she explained everything about the ceremony in details. I think she is going to have an active role in the work. She has even written an extra text that she will read before the main text. Probably it's going to be about love or something like that!

I had a one-week break from the work which i needed so much. Everything is in an acceptable stage now. I'm so happy with our sound designer and light technician. They are both so enthusiastic and good in their work. Ilkka Pitkänen-whom I got to know more in Istanbul- will help me with editing and technical problems. Although I love editing and I've been always editing my works myself, I decided to get help this time because we have only 12 days for post production of the video and at the same time we have to prepare the other things for the final exhibition. We got another little grant for the work which made us relieved! Now i'm less worried about costs of the work and the limitations we have because of that.

Istanbul is nicer than what I've always imagined and also colder! It's the city of satellite dishes!!

 

This hangover doesn't let me focus on the text i have to write. How many times can one promise not to do this to herself anymore. But it wasn't all bad this time. Drunken talks with Diego ended up with the idea of using Festivo candle holders of iittala in the marriage room. I still have to think about it.

 

From my iittala archive for "An Observation On Inhabitants of a Utopia"

 

 

 

Making the invitation card is becoming fun. We have dozen of romantic photos of white roses now!!

 

 

and this is the last test

 

We still have so much to change in the card but this last one is getting closer. the brown wizened parts of the flowers are more visible. We decided to repeat the boring grey color of the dress in the invitation card and maybe in the marriage room also so that's why that grey curtain is in the background.

 

We fixed the date and time of the marriage at last; 26^th of April at 5pm. Today they called from Helsingin käräjäoikeus and gave us the information of the woman who will come to our marriage. Now we have to think of a better way to explain the work to the woman.
We had decided that my dress for the marriage day shouldn’t be white or black, neither a strong color. It should be an office looking boring dress, maybe in grey. We had been suggested to check a store called ril’s, so we went there today. Most of the clothes were office looking and boring but we couldn’t find any grey one that can convince us at the same time. It’s so weird to try to ignore your own taste and to choose a dress for the work and not for yourself although you have to wear it yourself at the end.

 

 

We met Ray Langenbach in M bar today. He had only a few hours before his flight to Malaysia and it was a last minute discussion. Again we talked about the possibilities of him coming to Finland to witness the marriage and we made sure that there is no way to make it possible. But the good news is that he will come to Finland in May to see the work in the final show.
He talked about the position of the work towards the institutions and he was looking at it as a transition for me from an institution to another; from student visa to marriage visa. We discussed about the double character or double side of each element in this work and it was interesting to hear he has found more doubles in the work than what we had thought about. It was really important for me to hear his opinion about the work because I know him as a real academic person.

It was a really busy week. We talked about the work with Irmeli Kokko and Salla Tykkä that was really useful. We made the list of the guests for the performance. We met technicians and discussed the technical matters of the work. We went to registration office and took some good quality photos of their wedding room and we worked on the invitation card for the performance.

We decided to have some cheesy white flowers as the image of the invitation card. So one side will look like an exhibition card with the information of the work and the image side will look like a wedding invitation card. We took many good looking photos of white flowers but at the end we realized that the old ugly flowers work better related to concept of the work.

I think I know what to write to Tanja Ostojic now. Tanja is the best person to be the second witness of the marriage. I have to write to her tonight. I don’t think she will accept it at all, of course she has more important things to do. But even thinking about it makes me blissful. I always start a work from a very personal problem or something that is important for me in a very personal level and has tight relation with my own life but then during the process of producing the work I change it a lot that at the end nothing personal is left or at least is not visible for the viewer. It transforms to a more general subject. The same thing has happened to this work. The starting point has been what I was suffering so much from. Me and my problems with traveling and getting visa and all the exhibition and festivals and good friends I’ve lost because of that. But now we are focusing so much on the theatrical aspect of a wedding ceremony and looking at it as an existing script for making a video. But referring to Tanja Ostojic’s work by just having her, present in the ceremony will automatically make the link to the background of the work.

Ray Langenbach wrote me that he will not be able to come to Helsinki in April so I have to think about someone else to be the second witness of the marriage. Jaakko thinks that I’m thinking too much about the witnesses and it’s not that important but I really think it is. It would have been really great to have both my examiners as the witnesses of the marriage. I really like the idea of them having the role of the performers. There are so many things to be done during this weekend. AVEK application is getting so late. Jaakko is in Tampere working for the film festival and I have to do everything on my own. I have a terrible flue. Insanity will overcome soon!

I went to police office again today to give them my bank transaction statement. I was all equipped to record our conversations to use it in my video but unfortunately (!) nothing special happened and they accepted my application this time. Jaakko and I were thinking not to use the real sound from the wedding day but using the sound of our conversations with the immigration police officers instead. This makes the video independent from the installation and makes it informative enough on its own. I mean, it explains why the marriage is happening.

Today I had a studio visit with Khaled Ramadan and Georges Rabbath. I showed two older works and the graduation work. Khaled was somehow excited about the marriage project and gave my some new ideas. When he realized that I now about Tanja Ostojic’s work related to same idea, he told me that he is a friend of her and suggested me to contact her. He said she will be happy to hear that someone is developing her idea. I got Tanja’s email address from him but I don’t know if I can write to her. I really don’t know what to say.

I’m back in Helsinki which is a long story. It was the worst trip. Today the cinematographer that Kari Yli-Annala suggested me, told me after a month that she has so much to do this spring and she can’t shoot the work. It’s already the third cinematographer who refuses to shoot this work. The first one that was the most professional one asked us in December that why we don’t make a short film instead of shooting a performance. He suggested us to repeat the act of getting married several times so that he can shoot it properly. Well, I don’t know how many times a couple can get married in a day!!! Anyhow now we have a great light technician that I’m so happy with his work and I’m sure soon THE cinematographer will appear also

I came to Berlin yesterday. I have so much to do for the graduation work and I wasn’t sure if traveling at this time was a good idea but anyhow I had the residency of school and my work is mostly writing and planning the work so I thought it would be nice to be far from people I know and just concentrate on writing and to rest a little bit. But what happened was that there were so many people in the residency and I didn’t find it a nice place for working at all so I came to stay in my friend’s place that is much calmer. They were all from Royal academy and they will leave to Stockholm on Monday. I hope things will be fine then and I can go back there. It’s really a nice place.

Today I got another letter from school and took it to Malmi with the certificate of my study points. After they got the papers unbelievably they gave me another official paper, as official as the one I got a few days ago. This time it says that my documents are complete except another statement that they need from my bank that shows the transaction of my account in last three months. I got surprised and I asked them if they know how many hours I have to wait each time for giving one paper to them and why didn’t they tell me about the transaction statement the previous time. They didn’t even apologize. They said that they realized it when I left the office.

They are repeating the same game that they played last year. Last year I thought the only problem is that some of them lack intelligence and they just don’t know their job but to be honest that excuse can’t convince me today, neither it can stop me feeling terrible and crying like a stupid girl.

I’m in immigration police office in Malmi to extend my student residence permit. It’s nearly 4 o’clock and I’ve been here waiting in the queue since 11. All the blond people are gone and darker people are still here. Blond people–except Russians- have different queue numbers so that they don’t waste their time in such a scary place. I have totally lost my patience to stay in this place today. Maybe it’s just because I started to remember last May when I was here every few days and because of their mistakes and unorganized system I didn’t get my residence permit extended in time and I got stuck in Tehran which affected all my summer plans. I just have to keep thinking about good things now.

In the evening:
They didn’t accept my documents. They said the letter school has given me says that I can be enrolled next semester and it should say I will be enrolled. I didn’t get their point because the letter was in Finnish but the funny thing is that it was the same letter that I got from school last year and they didn’t have problem with it then. Anyhow they gave me an official paper that says all my documents are complete and if I bring this one letter from school they will start the process. I have more papers to include in the work now I have to come back to this hell again