Erin Sickler and Hana van der Kolk
Interior Beauty in Motion Fellows September 2022-April 2023
A witness tree is a tree that has stood in a place long enough to have borne witness to some important historical human—meaning past—event. These trees often bear this description for their unusual size, shape, coloring, or placement. In Gettysburg National Park, rangers have declared a dozen or so trees as witnesses, “witness trees.” (Although I have trouble associating the word “tree” with the word “war“.)
For me, all trees are witnesses, and their tense is everpresent. Perhaps it is selfish, in that typically anthropocentric way, to think that a tree would care for me one way or the other, but I’ve always felt, alone in the words, or with another in shared, ritual practice, that the silent witness of a community of trees is one of the greatest gifts on Earth.
For several years, friend, choreographer, healer, dancer, sage Hana van der Kolk and I have been meeting each other in a community of trees, most of them in the elderwilds of Troy, New York to dance, to move, to witness one another, and to create language in a practice called WitHnessing.
To be witnessed by the trees, as I said is a gift, a total feeling of acceptance quite the opposite of the digital world where we now conjoin. To be Withnessed by another person, the way that trees witness, is an ultimate expression of compassion and generosity.
Over the past three years, Hana and I have squirreled away an archive of shared words and movement from this WitHnessing practice. Here at the Interior Beauty Salon, we will present these shadowdances and secret languages--never meant for an audience--in the translated form of a correspondence, consisting of texts, videos, and workshops.
Erin Sickler, October 2022
this is a video poem/letter to Erin Sickler in response to the video that she made as part of our ongoing friendship/withnessing practice and our virtual "In Motion" residency with the Interior Beauty Salon. it is a collage that comes together from my video/audio/text/affect archives connected to my wider, ongoing, meandering friendship/withnessing practices.
contributors of materials include Erin Sickler, Jonah Moberg, Julia Handschuh, Van Tran Nguyen, the Panorama Jazz Band, and radial diamond kinetics participants. the song at the end is by me and Jonah Moberg.
Since 2019, Erin and Hana have been witHnessing each other, most often in the woods of Upstate New York and usually through the forms of movement and writing. Through this practice they have wondered about friendship, aging, courage and the process of finding recognition–as artists, as people–which they have found may, in fact, sometimes include becoming unrecognizable. This process has provoked them to question what it means to complete an artwork and by what means to locate or shape the form of an offering whether for a tree, one person, or a larger public. For the Interior Beauty Salon, they are excited to expand this conversation. As part of their residency, they will host workshops and invite guests, collaborators and interlocutors to creatively engage with this terrain.
Erin Sickler is a curator, writer, and lifelong mover. She received her BA in Art and Environmental Studies from Oberlin College and an interdisciplinary MA at NYU. Positions include Gallery Manager of the Esther Massry Gallery at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, NY; Director of Curatorial Programs at 601Artspace, New York, NY; and Assistant Curator at the Queens Museum, Queens, NY. She is currently Studio Director for the artist Randy Polumbo. Independently curated exhibitions include Mutadis Mutandis: Signo, Símbolo, Icono (Uno Caña, Mexico City), exhaust (Contemporary Art Tasmania, Hobart), and Prolonged Engagement (EFA Project Space, New York). Her art writing has appeared in Art in America, Artlink (AUS), The Brooklyn Rail, October, and numerous blogs and catalogs. Her poetry has been published in The Brooklyn Rail and as part of artist Freya Powell’s collection The Mnemosyne Atlas 2012. Residencies for non-fiction writing include Millay Colony, Austerlitz, NY and the Broken Hill Art Exchange in Broken Hill, Australia.
I'm Hana van der Kolk (pronouns any and all). I see dance as a conduit for knowing/unknowing what is here and now, for remembering intimacy at any proximity. I'm interested in leaning towards the uncanny, the messy and the boring in that process. Based on Mohican territory (Troy, NY), I am tending land and community. I am also often in Amsterdam (NL), was based in Los Angeles for years, and have taught/performed in many places and kinds of containers. I am nearing the end of a practice-based PhD with a collection of practices, a video piece and written dissertation titled Utopia's Stamina (which I borrow from Bernadette Mayer). I hope they will be nourishing offerings! I love my dog, my friends, the forest and all shades of pink and gold.
Erin Marie Siclkler’s related links: Instagram
Hana van der Kolk’s related links: Instagram / website
All images above courtesy of Erin Marie Sickler and Hana van der Kolk