OPEN STUDIOS SUMMER
18.07.2024
For this second open doors evening of the year, Hugo Hectus, in residence at La Becque as part of a partnership with ECAL/Ecole cantonale d’art de Lausanne, presented in-situ works in his apartment, inspired by lake observation, architecture and light.
Astrit Ismaili has revealed a series of drawings featuring both chaotic and harmonious interactions between the human, the supernatural and the machine, focusing on the amplification of voices, characters and narratives that have been forgotten or
erased from history.
Fascinated by the physical, chemical and spiritual aspects of materials, Luana Vitra has dedicated her work to exploring minerals. At La Becque, she created sculptures using magnets instead of solder to form ephemeral unions between metals, exploring the affective qualities of matter. Luana Vitra has also collaborated with Rizomagic and Time is Away to create sound pieces that facilitate dialogue with minerals.
Laureate of the Prix Jeunes Artistes Nestlé 2023 and first resident under a partnership with the Vevey-based institution, Sonya Isupova reflected on the meaning of living by the water, and drew a link between her residency on the shores of Lake Geneva and her experience beside the Kakhovska reservoir, an artificial lake formed on the Dnieper River in Ukraine.
Marina Rosenfeld showed her two-channel video and mixed-media installation project μ, or “mu”, which she completed at La Becque. Titled after the mathematical term for friction or touch, μ imagines the work of the stylus on the surface of a dub plate as an avatar in a space of quantum conditions in which sound, touch and movement entangle
During their residency, Time is Away drew inspiration from the La Becque landscape to produce Mountain – Garden – Lake, a series of three cassettes and three radio programs using archival material, field recordings and audio collages. For Open Studios, Time is Away invited us to listen to a selection of this work under the old lime tree next to their studio.
Resident as part of a partnership with the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia, Yara Asmar has chosen to show her project Mr. Samuel’s Teatime Stories (2024). Set in a rickety world between the false walls of an old abandoned children’s TV show, this four-part film recounts the reflections of Mr. Samuel and his puppet friends as they try to make sense of time through stories, songs and senseless tasks.
Also Pro Helvetia resident, the Rizomagic duo unveiled the progress of their new album, inspired by the slow rhythms of Cumbia Rebajada from Monterrey, Mexico, and by ambient music. Some of their compositions were based on recordings of Swiss soundscapes, in particular bird sounds.
Finally, Time is Away closed the evening with a DJ set in our lakeside garden, a few months after their performance during the residency’s 5-year anniversary.
La Becque, Open Studios, photo Aurélien Haslebacher