Maintenance of What?
A place, a thing, an idea

III


March 2023 - Boulegoa z/b, Bilbao (Spain)
Residency, open call 2022
Opening: https://bulegoa.org/en/sara-cattin-maintenance- of-what-a-place-a-thing-an-idea-part-iii-2/


Maintenance of What? A place, a thing, an idea is a project I started in 2018 at the Dutch Art Institute. It’s a broad research on the context of nomadic and semi- nomadic pastoralism –meaning tranhumant– and its powerful engagement with the maintenance of natural resources throughout extended geographies, disrupting the barriers imposed by private land property and law.


In the one month residency at Buleoga z/b I gave it the chance to take a different direction.

The Basque Countries didin’t hold on to a tradition of extended transhumances because land division doesn’t hallow easy passage of live stock. Pastoral properties are not very large so shephers preactice “transmitencia” meaning fast and short movements to an other location near by, for example to a higher grazing for the all summer.
Nevertheless, I soon had again the reassurance that pastoral cultures communicate to eachother from over the world. Nomadic shepherding didn’t radically transformed throughout the millenials as much as it holds on to incredible similaries everywhere. There
is the feeling that shepherds can understand eachother even if practicing within culures that come from very different roots.

The research transformed into the game of “finding the shepherd”, no matter in what form:
I found people, artists, artworks, researchers, stories, businesses, friends, animals, families, and books.


Elena Galan had been one of my main sources. She’s a researcher on chilmate change and agricultural policies in the Basque Countries, and she’s a shepherd as well. In the Summer she goes to the French Navarre with her dog Oki to take care of a flock on a mountain. Through Elena I’ve learned about researches that study sheep intelligence through their pattern of movements.

She also introduced me to other young women who traver the world while studying and being shepherds, advocating for climate justice and sustainability within a large social web. Our conversation is recorded in an aoudio piece and translated into “written maps”.

PEOPLE AS TERRITORIES



Video work (in progress) IN THE TERRITORY OF ELENA GALAN.
Through Elena I discovered the book of Sandra Ott “The Circle
of Mountains. A basque shepherding community”, published
in 1981. This etnographic research is her PHD and one of the greatest books written on basque pastoral culture. In the village
of Sainte-Engrace, in the southeastern corner of Soule (France), a community sturvived for centuries with a strict system of social and labor roles based on rotation and replacement.

Elena introduced me to her way of shepherding and taking care of animals in connection to practices such drawing and weaving, ways of archiving, reducing to the minimum, and other things. Her note book looked like an artwork to me.

I also encountered the audio and praphic work of the basque artist Nader Kootchaki on bells “Dorsal Landscape”. As he narrated to me, he had met Sandra Ott himself while visiting Sainte-Engrace for producing a commissioned artwork.


Video work (in progress) A QUESTION OF PRODUCTION AND PRESERVATION.
The rest of the research deepened into the material of wool as a primary element that survives human kind and represent life circles. The main part of the video combines the images from the visit to an old wool factory, now closed, with the sound of a guided tour in an underground cave.

Both the videos aim to become a video essay.


CREDITS

AUDIO AND MAPS
Audio material from conversation between shepherds and researchers Elena, Zuriñe, and Celia, with Sara.
A4 text maps.

Wool, 800 gr, by Piral Sebrango (Cantabria), by sheep Bischotkito.
Metal, design by Sara Cattin, metal work by Marta Lorenzana.
Book, “The Circle of Mountains. A basque shepherding community” by Sandra Ott (Univerity of Nevada Press, 1993).

IN THE TERRITORY OF ELENA GALÁN
Video, audio, 7’ 40’’ (work in progress)
Drawings and text (English) by Sara Cattin; voice Carla Tapparo; translation to Spanish and Basque by Bulegoa.
The content had been developed in relation to the work and research of Elena Galán (Postdoctoral Researcher at Basque Center for Climate Change, shepherd) and Nader Kootchaki (sound artist), and in relation to the text “The Circle of Mountains. A basque shepherding community” by Sandra Ott (Univerity of Nevada Press, 1993).

A QUESTION OF PRODUCTION AND PRESERVATION (working title)
Video, audio (work in progress)
Images by Sara Cattin and Samuel Ramiro.
In the video and audio materials are included: guided visit at La Encartada Fabrika-Museoa (Balmaseda), guided visit at Cueva de Pozalagua (Karrantza), images of an art piece by artist Laurita Siles (Karrantza), conversation with Joseba Edesa at organization Mutur Beltz (Karrantza).

A PILY PORTRAIT
Video, audio, 4’ 35’’.
Images by Sara Cattin.
With shepherd Piral Sebrango, Lerones (Cantabria), and Cecilia Hernandez Bellon (Bulegoa, assistant of production).