This morning, instead of an alarm, I was woken by the sound of a gong coming from the next room.
It was Jochen, while Sasha was preparing breakfast: toasted bread, butter, and honey. At the same time, I could smell rose tea, into which she had added fresh mint from the balcony.
As the sound of the gong slowly faded into the space, we sat down at the table.
I felt a certain peace and happiness at seeing Sasha and Jochen again, and at having breakfast together. We talked about life, art, and war – about Berlin being a potential flashpoint, and about some forecasts saying that a war could begin somewhere around March 2028.
We talked about where we would go if there were a war.
All three of us agreed that it would definitely have to be an island, somewhere in Greece – Hydra, for example, where we had actually met. Hydra is our portal.
That is where we are happy. That is where we swim, where we breathe beautiful air, where we love each other, where we lie in the sun, where we look at the sky and infinity.
We finished breakfast.
Sasha gave me my belated birthday present. My birthday had been on September 9th, and she gave it to me on September 13th.
When I opened it, inside was Sasha’s drawing of me holding an abstract luminous object in my hands. It was actually my new work, which I am preparing, called ACOUSMATIC OBJECTS. Sasha knew nothing about it, but somehow she had sensed it, because we are connected by invisible threads.
On the other side of the page, it said:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
HAPPY MORNING
HAPPY EVENING
The gift moved me so much.
We drank the last sip of tea and changed out of our pajamas into our daytime clothes, because by 4 p.m. we were supposed to be at Reethaus for a listening session by Soundwalk Collective and a work from the Venetian Pavilion called THE EAR IS THE EYE OF THE SOUL.
Jochen left us because he had to go to therapy, saying that he would join us later.
Sasha took her electric bike, and an electric Lime bike was waiting for me in front of the building.
Sasha told me that we would first ride through the chaotic city for a while, and then continue through a wooded area beside the water.
On our way there, we encountered Cattelan on the street. Not physically. Through one of his billboards. The campaign for his exhibition NIGHT at the Neue Nationalgalerie was still everywhere, during the day and night. He kept appearing. From every direction. On walls, in windows, in our field of vision. Eventually, he entered our heads too, against our will. At this point, it’s becoming a public health issue.
Once we entered the wooded area, we could no longer see Cattelan, or billboards, or cars – only trees, the path, and water on the horizon. And ahead of me, Sasha was riding the whole time in her daytime outfit, which looked like MOVING SPRING.
I called out to her:
“Sasha, you are looking from my perspective like Moving Primavera. You are my Moving Primavera.”
We laughed, and soon we arrived at Reethaus.
We parked our bikes and entered through a beautiful garden.
When we went inside, I had the feeling that I had entered someone’s private house — a Taoist temple, almost. Everything was so elegant, peaceful, fragrant, and clean, like a dream.
We took off our shoes and entered a large room where people were already lying on the floor and on cushions. A composition by Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst, Quisque Mutatus, was already playing.
Then we lay down on the floor. In silence, we looked at each other and intertwined our fingers like two frogs becoming one. And we closed our eyes…
Then we felt someone approaching. It was Jochen. He lay down beside us.
And then I had to leave, because at 7 p.m. I had a light check at Hamburger Bahnhof for SONIC PILL/OW, the performance I was presenting as part of Berlin Art Week in collaboration with Kuboraum Editions.