I was born just outside of Detroit, a “city-girl” to my parents, who grew up in the farmlands of Iowa. My ancestors were Lutheran immigrants from Germany, who worked as farmers, teachers, nurses and engineers. My father was a civil engineer and my mother raised my sister and I, while starting a non-profit organization reusing industrial scrap as creative material. Most American teens have a random selection of formal and informal jobs, preparation for our future as “independent citizens”. I was no exception. Before graduating from University, I had worked as a life guard, an origami teacher, a camp counselor, an assistant stained glass window maker… I had built exhibits for a science center, created Christmas displays at a mall and processed graphics for a t-shirt printing company.
After graduating from art school, I set off in my car to visit residential art spaces and artist communities throughout the States. During that trip, I learned about Res Artis, a international network of residential art programs that was having a conference in Australia the following year. I had to go. That conference began my three-year nomadic period, working on as many projects in as many countries as possible – developing artist residency programs and proposals for nomadic festivals, documenting art collections and helping to organize the next Res Artis conference, eventually ending up in Istanbul in 2006, as an artist-in-residence myself. Tired of moving, wanting a place to live for a few years instead of a few months, I decided to stay in Turkey. That meant, of course, I needed to make some money. After the Res Artis conference, I had started working 10 hours a week as their website editor, but this was not enough to support myself in İstanbul. Through a friend, I started working for some wealthy families in Istanbul, playing with their children in English for a few hours each week. I also found a job writing data reports for food products new to the Turkish market. These jobs introduced me to aspects of Turkey I would never have known about.
After a year in İstanbul, I started a project space, the first Caravansarai, soon realizing that I fell in-between most traditional ways funding such projects. I didn’t have a family in İstanbul, I had to manage my own living situation and develop my own networks of reliable advice and support. To support both Caravansarai and myself, I was working four jobs. Though exhausting and completely unsustainable, it gave me first hand experience producing projects in İstanbul. After a year of Caravansarai, I left the space and quit two of my jobs, turning towards my artwork, participating in several exhibitions and workshops. My jobs and my artwork complimented each other, one providing the content, supplies or professional connections for the other. Soon after, I was missing art school, craving an inspiring production space, a multi-disciplinary meeting point. I wanted to re-start Caravansarai, so when I found a partner, a friend I had met the year before in İstanbul, we started making plans. Since we were neither Turkish nor European (she is an American also), we didn’t have a family building or foundation endowment, and we were not interested in applying for or reporting on European funding, we turned towards what we knew best. Modeled after our own lives, we helped Caravansarai to “get a job”. Taking inspirations from dozens of spaces and organizations in countries without heavy public funding, we created a small-business structure for our space, focusing some of our efforts on money-generating activities, leaving us free (and mildly funded) to do the projects we dreamt of producing.
3.03.2010
After graduating from art school, I set off in my car to visit residential art spaces and artist communities throughout the States. During that trip, I learned about Res Artis, a international network of residential art programs that was having a conference in Australia the following year. I had to go. That conference began my three-year nomadic period, working on as many projects in as many countries as possible – developing artist residency programs and proposals for nomadic festivals, documenting art collections and helping to organize the next Res Artis conference, eventually ending up in Istanbul in 2006, as an artist-in-residence myself. Tired of moving, wanting a place to live for a few years instead of a few months, I decided to stay in Turkey. That meant, of course, I needed to make some money. After the Res Artis conference, I had started working 10 hours a week as their website editor, but this was not enough to support myself in İstanbul. Through a friend, I started working for some wealthy families in Istanbul, playing with their children in English for a few hours each week. I also found a job writing data reports for food products new to the Turkish market. These jobs introduced me to aspects of Turkey I would never have known about.
After a year in İstanbul, I started a project space, the first Caravansarai, soon realizing that I fell in-between most traditional ways funding such projects. I didn’t have a family in İstanbul, I had to manage my own living situation and develop my own networks of reliable advice and support. To support both Caravansarai and myself, I was working four jobs. Though exhausting and completely unsustainable, it gave me first hand experience producing projects in İstanbul. After a year of Caravansarai, I left the space and quit two of my jobs, turning towards my artwork, participating in several exhibitions and workshops. My jobs and my artwork complimented each other, one providing the content, supplies or professional connections for the other. Soon after, I was missing art school, craving an inspiring production space, a multi-disciplinary meeting point. I wanted to re-start Caravansarai, so when I found a partner, a friend I had met the year before in İstanbul, we started making plans. Since we were neither Turkish nor European (she is an American also), we didn’t have a family building or foundation endowment, and we were not interested in applying for or reporting on European funding, we turned towards what we knew best. Modeled after our own lives, we helped Caravansarai to “get a job”. Taking inspirations from dozens of spaces and organizations in countries without heavy public funding, we created a small-business structure for our space, focusing some of our efforts on money-generating activities, leaving us free (and mildly funded) to do the projects we dreamt of producing.
3.03.2010
