Cultural cooperation encompasses the exchange of approaches, models, strategies and policies with the goal of learning from each other’s experiences; pooling of resources, co-financing; technical assistance, transfer of know-how and training; joint reflection, debate, research and experimentation; and in  its most complex forms, cooperation in the creative processes, the creation of new artistic works. In all these facets the international component also implies inter-cultural relation and transaction, sometimes even confrontation.

I’m perfectly willing to give a high value, for example, to art and poetry and literature. They add value to society. It may not be easy to measure it in a society that measures too much of what’s not important — and not enough of what is important. As the sign in Einstein’s office said, “There are some things that count that can’t be counted. And some things that can be counted that don’t count.

Curator Katherine Carl and Architect Srdjan Jovanovic Weiss proposed a TransAction concerning their project, Lost Highway Expedition. Srdjan is Serbian, Carl is American, they lived most recently in Basel, Switzerland. The Lost Highway Expedition took place last summer on a route between the capitals of the countries formerly combined as Yugoslavia.

The TransAction interchange was a collaboration in a multi-tiered circumstance that is probably best to outline:

1. Carl/Weiss were asked to collaborate with Neurotransmitter (Valerie Tevere and Angel Nevarez) on the project “FM Ferry Experiment.” FM Ferry Experiment was a radio transmission from the Staten Island Ferry conducted over three weekends in September. (Tevere and Nevarez participated in the Lost Highway Project.)
2. Katherine and Srdjan asked me to participate in the radio broadcast as a TransAction. It was clear from the beginning that I would most likely be doing the live broadcast from the boat on my own.
3. My contribution was to describe photographs taken on the Expedition, which I had heard much about, but was unable to attend. I had no idea what the photos were of, but I did have the chance to see them beforehand.
4. Schedules required us to come up with a plan B, as none of us seemed available for the boat. So we made a recording to submit as our collaboration.
5. An interesting development was that I had become available to do the broadcast live, so we knew going into the recording that I would be using the recording as a backup, if at all. The recording of that event is here as an MP3 below.
6. When the date came, I boarded the boat to do a performance in which I re-enacted my improvisation of descriptions of places I’d never been, and played segments from the recording of my globe-trotting collaborators, who had refrained from speaking during my descriptions (as a way of implying not being there); while Neurotransmitter, who had been there and were there now, were too busy dealing with the challenges of broadcasting from a working ferry to be able to listen live (but will be putting podcasts of the show online). We were required to tear down the studio during my segment and concluded it about an hour later on another boat. Valerie resorted to “cell-casting” a portion from her mobile phone while Angel re-set up the studio. The film crew shooting footage for a documentary on radio was happy to have the action!

Every layer of the circumstance was a source of excitement, and I felt that the art that emerged was successful; the entire TransAction was priceless in terms of helping me be a part of an Expedition I had hoped to join, and in meeting new artists Tevere and Nevarez, whose work I had admired from afar.

MP3 of the TransAction.

Some of the images described:

by Kyong Park

by Ana Dzokic

by Giulia Fiocca & Laia Solé

by TBD

by Ana Dzokic

  by Kyong Park

more to come…

Artists often collaborate or otherwise interact informally, though not as often as they should, considering how beneficial it is to them. Collaborations/interactions/TransActions are beneficial in all the ways you alluded to, and I agree that it is not because some wonderful product is necessarily going to come of it. But the greatest benefit is the unspoken, implied one. TransActions build community.

I think what is needed by artists is more community and not more programs on how to make more art, as if we’re not making enough already. Despite the art life being at times profoundly fulfilling, what I hear from artists is that it does not meet their basic human needs as creatures of a greater society. As a sociologist might say, it does not help them to feel competent, choiceful, connected and respected. If artists cannot get these needs met in the greater society, why not then get them met in a community of our own making, the community of artists?

I only just saw here at the Anchorage Museum the film “Who Gets to Call It Art?”, the story of Henry Geldzahler and the 1960′s art scene. Even though it talked about art and artists, it was essentially all about community. Seeing it after having read your idea of TransActions was a thought-provoking combination.

As you said, the things you propose we do are things we do already, but the genius of your idea is in the acknowledgment of them, in the recording of them, the notice given them and so the validation and encouragement gained by the importance put upon them. It is the formalization of the usually informal. And as with the angels in the film “Wings of Desire”, the power comes not from the ordinary things being listed, but from the very listing of them. All this has the effect of encouraging an artists’ community, of connecting artists and making important those things we do. This helps to fulfill those basic needs that all have, needs which often in the arts these days are fulfilled by negative actions which results in the the look-at me art, in-your-face art, the aren’t-I-terrible art, all which proves a competence that is not necessarily of an artistic nature.

So let’s get that record started. Can anything be too ordinary to acknowledge? I don’t think so. What is important is to see it as the record of connections between artists within our community. Tacitly encouraging ourselves to do something, anything, whenever possible, to strengthen this community. To make conscious the importance of all the little things we do with other artists, and to bring us all into the community of artists – wherever we may be. And I believe then that many, many other good things will result.

Russian artist Piotr Shvetsov and I met several years ago and take advantage of opportunities to get together when we are in the same country. Shvetsov participates in the project Now:Here:This.

At a recent meeting in the U.S., Shvetsov mentioned that he wanted the chance to do simultaneous portaits with a mutual artist friend. I followed up on that idea when I was planning to be in St. Petersburg in May, 2007. I sent Shvetsov a description of the TransAction project and proposed that we have a TransAction in which we make mutual portraits. (A description of the TransAction project is under the About this Project tab).

The St. Petersburg visit did not offer an opportunity for the joint portrait session, as Shvetsov was busy preparing an installation to be shown at Art Moskva. I took advantage of a studio visit to make his portrait.

Piotr Shvetsov, Peter Ferko, 2007, St. Petersburg, photograph

Nevertheless, the artistic exchange continued and the TransAction continued providing value. St. Petersburg is the home of the Hermitage, but also hosts an active group of contemporary artists and is beginning to sport commercial galleries. As the contemporary artists know most of each other, they form a tight group.

At an opening in a new gallery that consists of a doorway in a stairwell of the Pushkinskaya 10 art center, the work surprised several local artists, including Piotr Shvetsov, who showed up as “Daddy Cool.”

I hung out with Shvetsov and a group of artists and spouses after the show. While I can’t say I followed much of the Russian conversation, a nice chat with one video artist showed that things are similar everywhere: in a large city one gets lost, in a smaller city one knows everyone, but feels like there should be more happening.

We headed to Moscow later in the week and hit Art Moskva art fair, now in its 11th year.

After the fair, Shvetsov and I (and our family members) had a chance to relax a bit more, and he turned attention back to his half of the TransAction “bargain.”

Just when it seemed as though the convergence of free time and drawing materials would not occur, artistic creativity came to the rescue.

As we walked from our rented apartment toward the Metro station, Shvetsov arrived at his portraiture idea. Scouting the walkway, he picked up a discarded cigarette, pulled off the filter, sat me down on a railing and commenced my portrait by dipping the filter into a puddle of water and drawing on the asphalt.

The activity drew the attention of nearby shoppers. Chris Bashirov Newton documented the activities. The work was as fleeting as it was inspired. With crude materials and working against time, Shvetsov made a remarkably good likeness that I will treasure in my memory.

Peter Ferko, Piotr Shvetsov, 2007, water on asphalt in Moscow