In this blog, Rasha Hilwi, a Palestinian cultural journalist, writes about her experience at Solitude. She writes about her stories and experience, meeting with other fellows who come from different places and cultures in the world and about the fellows’ stories, through interviews about their works, but mainly about the cultural and social life in this place.
On one of the first days of August 2016 — a month in which a lot of fellows left the Schloss to go back to their homes, while some others went for summer vacations, and a few fellows stayed in the castle — I decided to prepare a Palestinian dish for a dinner. It was the first dinner party I made, and I sent an e-mail to the fellows’ mailing list asking who would like to join. About 16 fellows
Two weeks before he was supposed to leave Solitude, Farzin decide to write down »to-do list« of things he would like to do in the house with his partner Caitlin and the fellows who were there at the time. One of their initiatives was to make barbecue down the hill in front of the castle – where it’s allowed to do so. The other items on the list were to find a football field to play their last games before
I can’t remember when I met Jean-Lorin for the first time after I arrived at Solitude. Lots of good, ongoing, and deep friendship, and we still don’t remember when it started. With Jean- Lorin, Was it at one of the night summer parties by the temple in the backyard? Or during one of the dinner parties? Or maybe when I started joining »coffee on the stairs,« Jean-Lorin’s initiative of drinking coffee once a week, during the morning, on the right
It was few days before she left Solitude; we set on the Temple in the backyard on one of the summer’s sunny days. Both of us were very touched by the fact that Saadia will leave soon, but both of us know that part of what this place is about is to say “Goodbye” and “Hello” to people in the end and the beginning of each month — an idea that no fellow gets used to, even though that’s always
When I try to remember the first time I met Nayantara after I arrived in Akadmie Schloss Solitude, I can only remember that night: after we were back from the Euro games finals that we’d watched in one of the nearby beer gardens, I invited a few fellows to my studio for a bottle of single malt whiskey I brought with me. Nayantara came with Kunal and others, and she was sitting on the Sofa. This night turned into a
At a party, before I returned to my room in »Schloss Solitude,« I went to say goodbye to friends. In this place, when we say goodbye to colleagues at night, we say: »see you tomorrow,« or when we see them in the morning or during the hours of the day, having to part ways, we say: »see you in a bit« or »see you later.« In my first days here, these phrases started to take shape in another form.
Caitlin Berrigan I met Caitlin in her studio at Akademie Schloss Solitude in the last month of her three-month residency. It was our first talk face-to-face. The interview should have taken between 10 and 15 minutes, but we started to have a long conversation about our lives and stories. The common part of sharing stories was to talk about Beirut, a city that Caitlin had visited several times and I visited for the first time in December 2015. It was
During my first days at the Akademie Schloss Solitude, I could feel the spirit of the place and its magical effect on the fellows. A space that can include everyone from different places and cultures. And especially the fact that there is one of these spaces in the world, which are so rare, where there are no borders between people, in practice and not just theory. Beyond everyone’s work, it is filled with life to be talked about and shared.