Artist in Residence                 Bostadsbolaget Hammarkullen Göteborg Sweden 2005

During 10 months I had the opportunity to be an Artist in Residence at a local governmental housing company in a multicultural suburb, Hammarkullen,  in Göteborg. This was a in a special program run by the Swedish organization Skådebanan which commission is to work for cultural participation in the working life.
My project focused on the employees working as caretakers, gardeners,cleaners and administrators. The assignment I gave the project was to make the staff look at their work and at each other in a different way.
There were two parts in the project. There were once-a-week gatherings (15 min) that dealt with things in their everyday life for example- the meaning of the key, changing identity in working clothes, quizzes with images of details in their environment etc.
The other part was a more practical work trying to find ways of describing working in new ways.

Some of the visual projects:

Quiz
In every staircases there were notice-boards in cork. they wer all worn out but all different. The photos I made from 20 of them were worked in computer just changing the colours. Without revealing the orgin of the images we talked about abstrakt art. Then they had to guess from were the images came. Of cause the cleaners had the best guess.

Routines
Around the big square in Hammarkullen there are 9-floor houses with up 22 staircases in each building (on the map marked red). The caretakers and the cleaners are moving in the area every day in almost the same tracks doing almost the same tasks.
During one day every step of 3 individuals (1 caretaker - indoor work, 1caretaker - outdoor work and 1 cleaner) were recorded on the map. When the image of the map was taken away an abstract picture consisting of dotted lines was left. This picture was mirrored and repeated until a pattern was created. This pattern was printed on textile and called Routines - an illustration of their everyday work.

Diagram
The administrators were asked how their working-time was distributed. They had to fill 4 circular diagrams with different questions at issue. The first two focused on conditions that the employer had given- how the tasks were divided and with whom they collaborated. The other two focused on the employee’s comprehension of how their competences are used and what they appreciate the most in their work.
The diagrams were coloured in different colour charts for each question. As the circular diagram in based on entirety it is possible to change the form still keeping the proportions of the division. So the diagrams turned into squares.
The diagrams were now woven into one image.
In Diagram 1 the information from the two first question is vertical and two later is horizontal.
In Diagram 2 all information was turned to one centimeter stripes and woven together in purpose of a good composition.
Both the webs contains the information given in step one easy to read if you have the codes.

Crossing tracks
"A fugitive crosses his tracks" a book written by Aksel Sandemose in the end of the 50ieswas the origin to this action- the title more than the contents. The thought of us, all the time crossing each other’s tracks though in different layers in time over places and generations that makes us share our memories and experiences even if we never meet  is tremendous.
On Hammarkulletorget, the main square of this suburb there was one spot where most of the staff passed during the day. They all had to fill in to a map how they passed over this spot on a specified day. Some weeks later, a sunny day just before the vacations we made a reconstruction of the movements. A canvas was places on this spot and they could all choose a colour. Soles and tires of tractors, mopeds and lawn-movers etc., were dyed (stained). Then everyone passed over the canvas, according to the reconstruction scheme, leaving their tracks.
The canvas was divided into 12 parts that were mounted. As there were no place big enough in the working space were the parts could fit in there had to be a new composition were only 6 parts were used. The new more concentrated picture was made by the staff together and is now hanging in the staff room.
A creative process that started with a philosophical idea, was illustrated in a real life situation that was the practical execution in time and space. Through re-composing the image it was not any more an image of a real event but an image of an idea.