Ulrike Königshofer

My trip to New York starts in September. Almost ten years before, I already spent a month there so that I already know the city a bit and had even been a guest at the apartment that now waits for me. When I arrive there, the panoramic view of Manhattan, nevertheless, quite overwhelms me. I move my bed next to the window so that I can fall asleep with the sparkling high-rises in view and wake up with the glimmering colors of New York’s sky. The neighborhood is very relaxed and green, not as stressed out as Midtown where I stayed before.

At the beginning of such a long residency, a lot of things have to be organized. My smartphone does not work in the US network and I have to get a new one. Little by little, I get my bearings and then the first thing is to visit museums. When I still was in Vienna I already made a list of exhibitions I wanted to see — there are so many that it took time to sift through all the information and to find the ones that were particularly interesting for me. In the mornings, during breakfast, I spontaneously find program for the next few days on Instagram again and again. Hence, I go somewhere every day – an exhibition at the MoMA, talks at the Dia Foundation, a performance in The Kitchen, a film festival at the Lincoln Art Center. In between, I find numerous books at the museum shops that I buy impulsively. The pile at home is getting higher and higher, but I have time to read them all. I absorb everything like a sponge. What is great about this city for me is this flow of opportunities that open up out of the blue.

Besides, I move into my studio at the ISCP in Brooklyn and I am quite happy there. The room is not as small as I had imagined, has big windows and is absolutely empty – in contrast to my studio in Vienna where everything is overflowing. I start to work there and, little by little, trace the walls on large paper sheets.
After one month, I give a talk on my work at the studio center. After another month, there are widely announced open studio days throughout the building on the weekend. Both take more time than I had assumed but it is worthwhile. The talk is well received and my installation for the open studio days is very nice and I get a lot of positive feedback and meet many new people.

Afterwards I notice that my energy level is slowly going down. Having a program every day works out fine for a while, but then you also need a break. I also realize that the artists living permanently in New York spend most of the time with their own work and hardly have the resources to see something else.

My time is slowly running out. I actually wanted to implement a drawing project here for which I would capture the empty walls of exhibition rooms on paper, but it turns out that it is extremely difficult to find the right contacts. I spend a lot of time writing uncountable e-mails to various people, but it does not work out. And then, a few weeks before my departure, I finally get a positive reply from the Gagosian Gallery, very spontaneously. And then another one and yet another one. This is how it comes that, after three months of groundwork during which nothing seemed to move, I have been at exhibition spaces every day for one week to prepare drawings on site. Finally. I produce a lot of material. The highlight is the Gagosian where invisible writing covered by numerous layers of paint shines through the paper, which astounds even the curator. She takes a picture of me and my work. A fat roll of drawings flies back to Vienna in diplomatic bags.

Website resident:              ulrikekoenigshofer.at