ONE SELF PORTRAIT EVERY DAY in 2020 : 131

Yesterday I noticed that on the Turtle Salon leaflet it mentioned that the next Turtle Salon would be in Düsseldorf and organised by Nüans. 

I search my old emails and find the delivery note from the t-shirt printers and see that half the t-shirts were to be delivered to me and the other half to Elmar Hermann of Nüans in Düsseldorf.

Sometime later, a guy (I think it was the same Elmar Hermann but I can’t find the email) gets in touch with me saying that he is putting together a book and would love to include a still from Amsterdam Fall. many months later I receive this beautifully printed book with a photo of me falling into the canal on page 22. I always thought they got in touch with me after seeing my video by chance on YouTube but in fact, Michael H. Shamberg and Turtle must have been the link.

On 29 January 2008, out of the blue, I get an email by a guy called Aaron Ohlmann:

“Right now, Rene Daalder and I are collaborating on a gravity themed

exhibit at the non-profit TELIC Arts Exchange March 1 – April 30th in

Los Angeles, featuring work by Bas Jan, Vito Acconci, Pipilotti Rist,

Guido van de Werve, Marco Schuler and many others. We are planning on

dedicating one room of the gallery to Bas Jan, and would like to show your film Amsterdam Fall.

if you are willing to participate, I would need full quality versions. 

I’ve found www.dropsend.com to be the most reliable (and free) way to

send files online. If you would prefer to mail them the old fashioned

way, they can be sent to: XXXXX

Thanks much. Look forward to hearing from you all, and please keep us

posted on future works and exhibitions.

Best,

Aaron”

I was very excited. Maybe I could become an artist. Having my work in the same exhibition as the likes of Vito Acconci, Pipilotti Rist and many others would be amazing. 

The exhibition was going to run from 1 March to 26 April 2008.

On 8 March 2008 I get another email from Aaron:

“Dear Daniel,

Despite our best efforts, we were not able to include your work in the

Gravity Art exhibit at TELIC Arts Exchange in Los Angeles. When I

initially contacted you, we had two rooms planned, a large room and a smaller room where we planned to show your film. Unfortunately, we lost access to the smaller room in the final week

before the exhibit, and had to make the difficult last minute decision

to exclude all the works slated for that space.

That said, we believe this exhibit has a future with other

institutions that will grant us the space to properly exhibit your

work and the many other outstanding films. We’ll

keep you posted on our efforts.

Best regards,

Aaron”

I was surprised about how I wasn’t that disappointed. Maybe it was because the exhibition was in LA and I wouldn’t have experienced it anyway. The good news was that my work was really “cancelled” at the last moment so it was still included in the catalogue, on the posters, in the press release and on the website.

If you google my name together with Vito Acconci, this exhibition comes up.

https://kunstaspekte.art/event/gravity-art-2008-03

http://2003-2008.telic.info/latency/index.html

I love the fact that there are still traces of me taking part in an exhibition with Vito Acconci even though I never did. 

If the opposite had happened: if they showed my work but accidentally left my name out of the catalogue, posters, press release, website there would be nothing to show.

This made me think that maybe the art is in the traces and not in the works so maybe it’s more worthwhile to just make traces?

10.5.2020.

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