The Slow Adventure: A Year without Trees

In October 2021, Artica hosted the project: The Slow Adventure, a collaborative project between artist Floortje Zonneveld and the students of the Svalbard Folkehøgskole. 

The Slow Adventure is an exploration into the world we live in and an ongoing collective artistic research project. It raises a dialog that illuminates the landscape and gives insight into the nature of our surroundings. Collaborating with young people, the various workshops and site-specific experiments are designed to open up the senses (touch, sound, vision, smell), igniting curiosity and inspiring moments of discovery.

The project began in the deserted settlement of Pyramiden, a former Soviet coal mining town which was abandoned in 1998. This isolated and quiet place offered the perfect combination of rich and varied stimuli along with solitude; allowing the students to focus and reflect on their surroundings, without distraction. After the students had completed the various creative tasks and storytelling exercises they were challenged to look for similarities and themes that could be shaped into a collaborative project. 

Introducing the students to Artica’s residents (Andreas Siqueland and Ignas Krunglevicius) they also had an opportunity to learn about different ways of working. How their own research, experiences and the creative process can be turned into artistic expression.

“Meeting Andreas was very inspiring. It was very interesting to hear how he takes inspiration from the things around him, even things that aren’t visible, and makes it into an artwork.”

“Ignas’ artwork inspired me to experiment with alternative ways of making art, I liked the way the sound made me feel.”

As the students had all recently moved to Longyearbyen, one of the themes that was discussed was the concept of “home”. Although there were many aspects of Svalbard that were new and exciting to them, there was also a lot that reminded the group of where they were from. They decided it would be nice to document these reflections in an audio-walk, a sound based scrapbook of thoughts and memories which can be listened to whilst out walking; inspiring the listener to reflect on their own surroundings.

The title of the audio-walk is “A Year Without Trees”.

We invite you to listen to the audio-walk whilst out walking, wherever you are.