Residency Reflections: Kanyike Edgar, Gudskul — Indonesia

I was really excited to have my first residency. I got to have a lot of first-time experiences like my first photo book, first solo exhibition, first story. It was an indescribable experience!

I went to the residency with the goal of trying to find out what aspect of identity I wanted to work with and when I got there, I realized I had actually limited my self to the idea of identity and they were so many other concepts I had ignored.

So I decided to use the time there to explore what these other options might be and also experiment with different processes of creation, to have that experience.

After many days of studying the environment and writing lots of different plans for lots of unrelated concepts — I decided to use the residency to research about the cultures and traditions of Indonesian people through dance. I did that because it is one of the arts that I connect which makes it easy for me to use it as a door to enter a complex environment of new culture and identity. I also use it as an experiment where I store memories from a certain place, situation or interaction and then use those emotions as the basis for a dance piece as a “movement portrait” for a particular place.

I also decided to use the photography for research-based documentation of the environment and people of Indonesia in hopes of finding an interesting bit about this environment that could help me figure out what exactly I want to focus on but it, in turn, became an interesting project on its own that turned into the photobook, ‘30 Days of Jakarta’.

My art is one of the aspects of my life that I want to invest a lot into, I consider myself lucky to have got this residency. The opportunity to have practical experiences of research, processes of creation, new challenges, being able to share our culture through dance workshops and so much more.