the fly
2021
field recording, photography, text
contribution for the interactive gallery space: KoKoMo
Created by the artist Ava Halloran, KoKoMo is an interactive website based on storytelling that aims to gather and connect its participants’ experiences, to show how their conception of space, both at home and further afield, changed during the Covid-19 lockdown of Spring 2020. Through sound, text and visual mediums, the site collates over twenty-five stories from participants aged between 4 and 74 living in different countries.
Berlin, April 2020 — A month might have passed since the beginning of isolation. I have a hard time wrapping my head around things as time slowly dissolves into endless sun-moon cycles. Days are becoming strikingly similar, and my grip on them gently loosens. Each morning, I dive deeper in time’s quest for inertia while I repeat the same routine again and again. I have learned from my feline friend how to cherish the fleeting moments when the sun’s beams hit a corner of my room. I sit there with empty thoughts as the burning body pursues its daily curve. It’s blooming season again, and flies, wasps, and other insects wake up from their winter slumber. I now pay much more attention to the ones visiting my flat. I do not recall an instance where I have felt this close to a fly - both trapped inside, pressing ourselves against the transparent glass, craving for fresh air and space to roam. Forced into this finite territory, we both have to reinvent and rethink our existence far from old narratives. I do not wish to end up flying in haphazard cubic forms - changing course in the face of imaginary corners - nor exhaust myself trying to break through the stainless apertures. Thus, I channel my thoughts and energy into mind topographies where I can wander freely and meet old ideas and desires - like I would meet old friends - that have been lingering for a while. And so, in this unfathomable time, I dive in forgotten projects while being guided by the endless buzzing of flies.