Ela Hornung: Watching ao3....Retrospective views of the KANTINE

Space (concept: mainly: Heimo lattner)

The entrance: a darkened labyrinth, black, thin plastic foils, the eyes partly have to accomodate to the darkness, partly statistical projections, I feel like being put back into old party times (Gothic or kissing caves), the hallway opens itself into an equally black, darkened room (a birth in darkness?), permanent night, kept away from the outside.

Left: the technical equipment is looming triumphantly over the sounds: monitors, PCs, mixing desks. etc., decent lighting, a close approach is not allowed, plastic demarcation bands in red and white prevent you from getting closer. (Is this what is most valued by men because it's them who I mostly see) A distance of respect?! To the right as mall room (within time)created through the foils, which should later be called "Tea House", you can sit on the floor, drink English tea, listen to sounds. From time to time, there are video projection onto the wall of foil. (One time, toast, sausages, Ketchup, and mustard are served with English tea and radio orange tuning in the back, very "sixties, familiy-like nice" ... outside, there are videos on a slaughtering, we inside didn't know about it and saw it upon leaving.)

Left: The heart/center: the KANTINE, a small kitchen (in fifties' size), the cooking plates remind of camping, a fridge, a real mess of spices, the mixer is orange, Marmite, Ketchup, mustard, toast, eggs, sausages, Behind the kitchen secured behind a wall , the eating place, long tables, behind sometimes video projections, mostly by Richard Crow, his performances or something more private... (Could that be the TYV of the Kantine?, which, after a period of time, nobody really watches anymore?)Process: different every day/night, excerpts, interesting stuff, complex, chaotic processes, possible expectations of presetnations are interrrupted, or not, more experimental to more conventional sounds ("talking sounds"), videoes are brought along, running almost endlessly, on different walls, there are some small outbursts, mineral water spraying actions, spontaneous and more rigid structures (Phill Niblock's musicians play one night, great ambience). You have to be prepared for a different time - slowliness - necessary, more aggressive moods, boredom, hanging around, tunes, DJs, drinking, thick sandwiches, a hectic state, Crow as cook, ostentatively with white apron, talks ... specials to choose from: Serious drinking, Walk in the Cemetery (Richard Crow visits dead composers, he honors Schönberg, but more Webern), Brunch/London Grill, Hangover cure, live mixing with recordings from the cemetery with Clive Graham, opening party, ao3 for hours on the Kunstradio....

Special concert at WUK: Kaffe Matthews and Phill Niblock (with guests: Ulrich Krieger, Dean Roberts, Martin Zrost, Werner Dafeldecker, Burkhard Stangl, Bernhard Gál, no single woman) Kaffe Matthews, the only woman of this group is present in the kantine only at the beginning. Almost a star, her solo is placed more prominently than those of the other artists of the KANTINE. The trained violinist who almost never uses the violin only once carresses her instrument. Sounds from the room are being recorded, erupt and ebb down, transformed with a special computer program and presented in a special live-sampling performance. Kaffe Matthews as "witch master" in front of her mystical mixing desk - impressive.

Phill Niblock and his guests. Brian Eno once knowingly called Niblock the "Godfather of Ambient," the musicians with electric guitars sunk in front of the blue permanent video picture: NO SIGNAL, then, unfortunately the video. Good music, solid and honorable, somehow already historical, static tunes in half-hour intervals, sublime sound modulations, trained ears are necessary, the turning into meditation or boredom, learn to use your ears differently, to create my own concert with a different handling of the ears themselves. Alltogether inspiring, but not very surprising, and the travel videos on old forms od handcrafting which Phill Niblock records on his trips. ( Why does muscic almost exclusively accompany pictures during this week? A link to the aesthetically tradtitional videos does not exist for me at this evening.)

Intersection: Sunday, May 9, the days of the KANTINE go by, the space has already changed, a pipe has been put through the Kantine in a phallic order, the windows not darkened, the sun is shining into the room... , noise from outside. On Saturday, the first renovations have begun, reports from a tension-loaded Saturday crossover (first and second group), possesory titles, more or less unsensitive changing/renovation work starts, there does not seem to be a communication on different concepts of space.

Sunday brunch: feedback and open discussion accompanied by toast and eggs with artists and friends. The mood is aggressive to sad now, you can feel that something comes to an end, speechlessness, touchyness, criticism that the evening's rubbish has been removed, was thought to be some art material for the next day, farewells are coming, attacks/destructionsand not a lot of positive connections to the Kantine are about to develop. Only the Kantine/kitchen remains. ( Does one have to see everything so negatively to differentiate oneself, to be able to continue to work, what can you work upon now? And why?) You'd want to have more communication between the artists and their concepts in the crossing area of competition and necessary differentiation, a wish of the overlapping groups, something that makes sense, but time is too short.

At night: The dismantling is finished, new construction starts, dinner at the kantine, like many times during this week, somebody cooks. Ingo Nussbaumer's "eunoptic chicken (red wine-colored chicken)" leads the first and second group to a new wedding" at the first group's "last supper."... The table breaks, Peter "the drill man" (Crow) puts the table together with a lot of noise. The evening finishes with a concert by Alan Licht and Dean Roberts (an impressive artist from New Zealand) at Rhiz and has almost a happy end.

Will see what the next weeks will bring. To be continued. Ela Hornung.

Translation: Walter Seidl