CONVERSATIONS DÉPLACÉES [Misplaced Conversations]


la Marelle Villa des auteurs, Marseille, from March 1st to 31st, 2015
Writing residency for an edition project in process. A book composed of 400 typed pages : the « Agency Writings », raw writings typed during the « Conversation Agency »*, in several cities from 2002 to 2012. These documents will appear with an editorial set (keywords index, glossary, process explanations).

A month dedicated to searching process, open to public during Made In Friche, on March 27, 28, 29.

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Readin and looking
The writings that were produced in the Agencies are not interviews transcripts or mere testimonies – even if they are filled with the words of passers-by to whom we talked on the sidewalk — but more an impromptu form of writing that is invented during the here and now of an encounter. The corpus might be approached through its litterary dimension: the polyphonic, heterogenous, syntax-offensive, typos-becoming-typograms collective way of making literature, but of which the frame reveals the process (almost identical A4 or A5 pages on fluo paper including the date and place of the typing). Another way would be to look for some kind of a 'rumor of the world' within the mass of texts, that of the 'current events' perceived from the everyday standpoint, a mix of recurring themes and vernacular oddities through which the Agency connects with its area of establishment (topics such as the uprooting, common social issues, violence, the relation with god and religion, strangers, identity and the conversation itself…). These contents feed a reflection upon the conditions of people's appropriation of official history (through they're own axperience of war or exile…) and upon the 'blanks' left in that history. This aspects appear through cut-ups made from the general hearsay, creating incongruous or humorous images which are mostly reflections the interlocutors self-meckery. Lastly, these writings are also images, made from the 'grain' and the 'accidents' of machine-typing, the cutting-out of white pages against black typefaces is emphasized by wind-blowing through the blank-page/written-page rhythm of the book. We made the choice of reproducing the documents as they are, preserving their documentary and 'snapshot' nature (it's written, it's done) and the visibility of any writing operation (repetitions, crossed-out lines, typing or syntaxic mistakes…). Thus this editorial project has four dimensions at least: literature, sociology, history and graphic design, a plastic 'object', a text to read as much as to contemplate and a space to wander in.

*Conversation Agency
_definition : a table and several folding chairs, a portable typewriter, fluo papersheets, a few pieces of stationery, a « writer », the typewriter in hands, a « speech  activator » (interchangeable) and space for possible conversation. Writing, talking, posting. Around the Agency, the conversations of the day before, or from a different city are put up on walls or threads in the wind, ready to be read.
_use : talk with strangers and write outside, out of the underground station or on a marketplace (for example). Create a « conversation » archive, invent a writing style shaken by the outside.

The Conversation Agency, created in Grenoble during the two rounds of the 2002 presidential elections, has been moving since from Grenoble (Ici e[s]t ailleurs / le Cargo-Maison de la culture de Grenoble, 2002-2003) to Marseille (Musée d'art contemporain de Marseille invited by La Compagnie, le Merlan scène nationale, 2010-2012) via Port-Saint-Louis-du-Rhône (artistic residency at Ilotopie, 2002-2003), Échirolles (2004), Eybens (2004), Villeurbanne et Vaux-en-Velin (invited by Komplex KapharnaüM, 2004-2005), Kladno / Czech Republic (biennial Vestige of Industries biennial, 2005), Barjols (2005), Pau (2006), Bordeaux and Bègles (le TNT and Bruit du frigo, 2007), Pont de Claix (l'Amphithéâtre, 2011), the deck of a ship between Barcelona and Tangier (2011) and Casablanca (Casablanca Festival, 2011).
Non spectacular performance, informal collective creation included in urban everyday flow, Conversation Agency produced almost a thousand written documents (typed on the typewriter).

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