ARTEFACTOURISTS (EST) 2023-2024

Artefactourists* are a collective of four choreographers Valeria Januškevitš, Keity Pook, Sigrid Savi and Kadri Sirel and the dramaturge Kerli Ever. The dancers share a history of studying at Viljandi Culture Academy and the group recently worked together on a performance at Sõltumatu Tantsu Lava (2022). Their autobiographical investigation includes memory, labour, and the inherited working body in the Eastern European context. The group is developing a co-creative nomadic performance practice that, emerging from the body, remains truthful to individual needs within a group while concentrating on the experience of rooting amongst scattered identities.

* the act of remembering through movement; memories triggered by travelling through places and artefacts.

Parcitipating artists

Taken residency at

What is artefactourism and who are the Artefactourists?

First off – it’s a lifestyle, baby! Artefactourism relates to the journeys triggered within us by objects and places. These can be personal, but they also connect to collective memory. Artefactourism triggers the recognition of identities shaped by memories and the stories told to us.

Artefactourists are alternative archivists who map the historical and emotional narratives of a place. All of this through personal sensation, intuition, and synthesis, while being active collectors. Artefactourists engage with European museum and archiving traditions, reading objects and mediating history, but also consider the body as a legitimate source of knowledge.

What is your goal with the “Moving Identities” project?

The broader objective is to uncover blind spots of self-exploitation, exploitation of others, and the environment and to influence or change, trickster-like, how we view something and later think about it. We achieve this by extending and deepening collaborative practices, finding overlaps in our research trajectories and creating networks from them, perhaps in the form of an online environment where we map our research journey and results. We aim to achieve a synthesis where each artist’s unique practice can shine, allowing space for experimentation and sharing.

What methods do you use to achieve this goal?

We perceive the surrounding environment as reflective. Our practice involves triggering memories and stories through places and objects, translating them, reinterpreting, or doubting them. We scrutinize personal memory and collective memory, allowing new narratives to form, constructing and reconstructing identity. We learn to notice the emotional layers of a place – by reading, moving, mapping objects and trajectories with psycho-geographical methods, creating routines, mediating fictional and non-fictional environments, embodying stories, and narrating them through the social dreaming method.

How does your current project relate to your previous works, and what motivates you in this process?

In November 2022, we premiered the production “Artefactourism: Rumours and Ruins” at the Independent Dance Stage, for which we had previously been in residence in two distinct places: the Estonian Open Air Museum and the Kreenholm Manufactory. We asked what kind of effort is required to remember and engaged in highlighting symbols that consolidate community memory, looking at lifestyles, dreams, and ways of working characteristic of different eras. The international residencies of Moving Identities, however, give us the opportunity to raise our research questions in different cultural spaces in Belgium and Germany. A completely new dynamic is given by the fact that the focus of the current project is not on producing a performance, but on the process, which provides room for experimentation, going deeper, and also wandering. Additionally, our collaborative method last year was based on finding consensus, whereas in the current process, our interest leans towards broadening our collective creation method.

Interview with Artefactourists at Kunstplaats Vonk.

With project manager Stephanie De Bakker.

Watch interview here

Video credit: Saverio Sammartino.

<p><strong>What is artefactourism and who are the Artefactourists?</strong></p> <p>First off &#8211; it’s a lifestyle, baby! Artefactourism relates to the journeys triggered within us by objects and places. These can be personal, but they also connect to collective memory. Artefactourism triggers the recognition of identities shaped by memories and the stories told to us.</p> <p>Artefactourists are alternative archivists who map the historical and emotional narratives of a place. All of this through personal sensation, intuition, and synthesis, while being active collectors. Artefactourists engage with European museum and archiving traditions, reading objects and mediating history, but also consider the body as a legitimate source of knowledge.</p>
<p><strong>What is your goal with the &#8220;Moving Identities&#8221; project?</strong></p> <p>The broader objective is to uncover blind spots of self-exploitation, exploitation of others, and the environment and to influence or change, trickster-like, how we view something and later think about it. We achieve this by extending and deepening collaborative practices, finding overlaps in our research trajectories and creating networks from them, perhaps in the form of an online environment where we map our research journey and results. We aim to achieve a synthesis where each artist&#8217;s unique practice can shine, allowing space for experimentation and sharing.</p>
<p><strong>What methods do you use to achieve this goal?</strong></p> <p>We perceive the surrounding environment as reflective. Our practice involves triggering memories and stories through places and objects, translating them, reinterpreting, or doubting them. We scrutinize personal memory and collective memory, allowing new narratives to form, constructing and reconstructing identity. We learn to notice the emotional layers of a place – by reading, moving, mapping objects and trajectories with psycho-geographical methods, creating routines, mediating fictional and non-fictional environments, embodying stories, and narrating them through the social dreaming method.</p>
<p><strong>How does your current project relate to your previous works, and what motivates you in this process?</strong></p> <p>In November 2022, we premiered the production &#8220;Artefactourism: Rumours and Ruins&#8221; at the Independent Dance Stage, for which we had previously been in residence in two distinct places: the Estonian Open Air Museum and the Kreenholm Manufactory. We asked what kind of effort is required to remember and engaged in highlighting symbols that consolidate community memory, looking at lifestyles, dreams, and ways of working characteristic of different eras. The international residencies of Moving Identities, however, give us the opportunity to raise our research questions in different cultural spaces in Belgium and Germany. A completely new dynamic is given by the fact that the focus of the current project is not on producing a performance, but on the process, which provides room for experimentation, going deeper, and also wandering. Additionally, our collaborative method last year was based on finding consensus, whereas in the current process, our interest leans towards broadening our collective creation method.</p>
<p>Interview with <span>Artefactourists</span> at <span>Kunstplaats Vonk</span>.</p> <p>With project manager Stephanie De Bakker.</p> <p>Watch interview <a href="https://youtu.be/xKc7zlsJ2UY" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a></p> <p>Video credit: <span>Saverio Sammartino.</span></p>

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Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.