Elisabeth Sedlak

My three-month stay at the Cité international des arts in Paris gave me the unique opportunity to live very close to the places where the surrealists used to move about and were the most important collections and museums focusing on this movement still are today. I arrived in Paris on 6 January 2022, which was not quite easy due to the pandemic – especially at the outset when COVID infection rates were very high in Paris and access to research institutions was rather restricted. During my first weeks in Paris, I nevertheless tried to go to museums or look for bookshops and antiquarian booksellers as often as possible. Thus, I soon settled into Paris – in spite of calls for social distancing and working from home.

As masks still had to be worn in the streets in January, I worked a lot at the studio during that month, but already contacted several artists, experts and collectors in writing or by phone so that my schedule became busier and busier and I had several exciting appointments every day towards the end of the month. At any rate, life started to get easier: Infection rates went down, all research institutions were open and masks did not have to be worn outdoors. Moreover, there were already many sunny, warm days in February, because spring comes a bit earlier in Paris than in Vienna. Every Wednesday evening, several artists opened their studios at the Cité, which I liked immensely because I learned a lot about the work of the other artists living all around me. Besides, on these tours, I was simply able to get to know many special and interesting people whom I liked to meet and talk with during everyday life at the Cité.