day two in salzburg : purchases, items for the course, and initial inspirations

for the Artist as Nomad course we were asked to bring amongst other things, (including maps of anywhere- I have old ones of hastings, crystal palace, south east london, laos, thailand, places which which i hold a connection to- i have been/lived in/lust for) a small old piece of luggage which i picked up today in salzburg. apparently its 100 years old. it has a subtle horse print on the front.




i also liked this old postcard dated something '08, it was sent to hallein where the course is, and now ended up for sale in an antique shop in salzburg. interesting journey we can only imagine.

have also been thing a lot about the idea of travel, mapping spaces and places, triggered by what we've been asked to bring, and so also have this book kindly lent by dom,
You are here, Personal Geographies and other maps of the imagination, by Katharine Harmen

i really like this piece in the book which transforms a map into something quite different, "anatomical,"(and given my current location, seems apt!) by Nina Katchadourian, Austria 1997;


this could be an opportunity to consider the map transforming into another entity entirely, from 2D into 3D even.Thinking about how I love to shred things which were once important, making it redundant matter, is there scope to performatively make a map, through shredding, for example (and not in Nina's precision cut out manner) into another kind of map, or indeed another object or experience?

after writing the above, i turned to look at the window in my room, i like this curtain pattern, bus or tube map like, with its transparency to see the world beyond. normally with a map you look down at the map and then up at the world and try to align the two, from diagram into reality, here it is in one line of sight;



and the last thing to say about today and maps is how bloody annoying the maps are i have of salzburg alstradt, in a guidebook and in a pull out sheet version, none of the road names i looked up at were on the map. bad bad map :( although it means you do discover more yourself beyond the guide book:)