Today I was interviewed by the bright students of the Guissona Institute in Guissona, Catalonia. Joan Esc guided the whole proces. The questions were thoughtful and well formulated. The students participated in the Online Museum of Small gods and made up the most amazing Small gods! Soon you will be able to meet the newly made Small gods in the online museum!
With this new project, the Mythological Institute invites the audience into a research about the role of religion in our society. Can religion be seen as a way of systemizing spirituality, and if so, what are the mechanisms that create such a system? Is it possible to re-create these mechanisms by making up new and personalized gods?
In the Online Museum of Small gods the audience can create their own imaginary Small god and portray themselves as this Small god in a short video, which is placed on the website of the MI. Together they form an online collection of made-up divine and -at the same time- human entities. Creating a Small god is not meant as an act of capturing The Omnipresent, Almighty, Universal Entity, but as a playful research on the role of god(s) and religions in daily life and society. What can the online collection tell us about the mechanisms of religion, about spirituality and human nature?
Although the project is started by Jolijn de Wolf, Joan Escrivà-Escolà has been giving a Small gods workshop in Lleida, a small town near Barcelona. We are proud to present two new Small gods in the Online museum!
Sunday the 28th of January The MI had been invited as a guest at Daily Traces
Daily Traces is a pop up gallery in the Amsterdam central station. It is a surprise for train passengers and casual passers who suddenly become part of the dynamic work process and conversations about drawing. By working daily on site, the artists give the audience an insight into their own, individual approach and the audience sees the drawings literally.
Together with Liesje van den Berk, the MI researched how to connect with people in the station through the act of drawing. Participants could draw a blueprint out of their thoughts with the MI, adding to the ever growing Thought Blueprint Archive. Liesje van den Berk invited people to come and draw a continuous line with here, producing not only a drawing, but also a connection.
Thank you Liesje van den Berk Cathelijn van Goor, Liesje van den Berk, Marleen Kappe, Mirna Limon en Emmy Bergsma for including the MI in your amazing project!
From 13 October till 15 October The Mythological Institute opened the Thought Blueprint Archive, part of department of Jolijn de Wolf. Over 80 thoughts could be admired in the Theatre Academy of Helsinki, Finland.
The exhibition also featured a performance by Joan Esc from Department GIRL, Artist In Residence Kian Dowlatabadi and our two researchers in residence Eva den Heijer and Martine Mussies.
Sunday the 15th is was possible to listen to stories of Markus Luukonen, play the “tell your art-tale” designed by Eva den Heijer and to participate in a story meditation with Kian Dowlatabadi.
The Mythological Institute sends a big thank you to all the partcipants of the workshops and the visitors of the exhibition!
The first Though Blueprint workshop, facilitated by department SEWA, is a fact! Saturday 16 October participants from different nationalities and backgrounds came together to exchange their thoughts.
Following a questionnaire designed by the MI, the participants followed a step by step method to create an image out of their thoughts. These images then got translated into blueprints.
Enjoying a good cup of coffee or tea and some home baked snacks, everybody had an opportunity to share their thoughts and get to know each other.
Thank you for all your beautiful thoughts!
Since the 10th of februari 2017 asylum seekers protest on the railway square in Helsinki, against the Finnish goverment’s deportation policy. Some of the protesters were so kind to share their stories and thoughts with the Mythological Institite. Their stories will be filed and archived, so they will not be forgotten.
At the protest camp site, we transformed some of their thoughts into blueprints.Here are some examples:
Moving to the metro from the laid back Tacloban and its neighboring towns, the MI representatives met with researchers and MA students from the University of the Philippines Diliman. Jessa, MA English and American Literature and Mars, MA Art History, actively shared their thoughts and own experiences in relation to the concept of myths and to methods which can be deployed to approach the topic.
Jessa and Mars furthered that their respective MA thesis are closely related to the discourse of mythology and lore. The representatives of the Mythological Institute sees this as possibility for future research collaborations between the institute and researchers from the Philippines.
The Mythological Institute’s departmental representatives Jolijn de Wolf and Jay Albaos visited the young performers of SamLeYaw Dance Company today to hold a group discussion. The meeting was held at the Auditorium of the Eastern Visayas State University, Tacloban City, Philippines. The representatives briefly introduced the history of how the Mythological Institute was realized.
During the second part of the discussion, the participants were asked to pick a concept and discuss about it inside their group. They were also asked to give criticisms and suggestions towards the research methods of the Institute. Each group member exerted effort for the task. The small groups were then invited to go back to the bigger group circle for the sharing of outputs. The suggestions were constructive and definitely are of great help towards the next projects of the institute. The representatives responded to pressing questions from the young artists on how to deal with researches related to myths.
The group discussion ended with a communal meal and exchange of contacts for further questions and collaborations.
The Mythological Institute has developed a new way of working. Instead of going out on the streets, we organize mobile offices that the audience can visit. In these offices one can receive a consultation. the consultations are different from place to place. Our first try out was during the New Performance Festival Turku.
Department Place and Migration offered an opportunity to think about material belongings and migration. It was possible to make an donation to the migration kit. By holding interviews department representative Jay Mar Albaos collected data about what kind of objects one brings in case of migration.
Department Self Exploration and World Arrangement facilitated a consultation in which one could make a blueprint out of ones thoughts. Department representative Jolijn de Wolf designed a questionnaire, in which the participant gets the opportunity to explore thought patterns and make an image out of them. The thoughts are then made into a file and stored in the archive of the Mythological Institute.
Photo by Emilia Karjula, Jussi Virkkumaa and Christy Ann Balita
The Mythological Institute 