Arts Lab 7.0: Mohamed Eddaif | Month I

What a month, What a month, What a month! I repeat myself, but even that seems inadequate for the magnitude of things these past few weeks have contained. It wasn’t the launch of a program it’s been the introduction to a level of myself I’d yet to encounter. I came into all of this seeking work, seeking challenge, seeking creativity. What I didn’t sign up for was the extent to which all of these things would change me not merely as a creator but also as a person seeking to comprehend his own timing.

I came a little tired, a little disoriented, with that always-present cocktail of excitement and trepidation. And then the minute I got home, when people’s voices called my name from the balcony and people hugged me as if I were someone they had known a thousand times before I ever got there, well, that kind of changed things for me. It somehow lifted the fatigue. It didn’t feel like I was going to a place so much anymore but to a person, to a community that opened its arms wide. The smallest things  faces I didn’t recognize, the smiling and the sound of the kitchen, the clutter on the table  it all seemed so familiar somehow.

The days blurred into a busy rhythm. Which is exactly what I needed. And yet, shouldn’t it have slowed a bit? Couldn’t I have found a little time to catch a breath, time to even unpack the emotional and mental bags I brought with me? Perhaps the rush of living that I’m experiencing is necessary after all. Perhaps I’ve spent so much of my life waiting for the right moment to take a step into whatever the day brings that I’ve neglected the truth that sometimes I’m capable of doing a hell of a lot more than I ever gave myself credit for.

Since I wasn’t always able to use the equipment I had, I changed the career course I pursued each day first photography, then media work, then creative facilitation. I didn’t plan that career change. It was the direction of the day. Yet this experience taught me that I am a much more creative person than any single item of equipment, any single medium, any single discipline of work. I will be that way because I will allow the creativity to go wherever it wants. And the strange key to that freedom might be that I could then feel more of the artist within me than I could when I strictly

There were experiences that impacted me in ways I never could have anticipated. Singing with my roommate on stage, seeing the way the students converted cardboard into museum dreams, being caught in the center of the Pumpkin Festival with the cloak of cultural traditions and the sound of the crowd’s voice mixed with mine, taking pictures of the traditions with the sort of intensity I normally only put into 3D work. And even the nights spent wrangling cables and projectors and beating back the monsters of technology.

Yet it’s the folklore residency at Pașcani that really transformed me. The visa that came through late, then Marah’s illness, and the fact that we had so little time to get it all organized it launched me into challenges that I wasn’t yet qualified to handle. I found a kind of confidence I never knew I possessed, the kind that grows only when you are the strongest person in the room. And the students, with whom I share crazy ideas and sincere questions, are a reminder of why I teach.

The emotional change came quietly. Not with fanfare but with little details. The way I listened to people. The way I let myself rely on other people. The way I found comfort going into the kitchen each morning, knowing that someone would smile at me, crack a joke, or ask how I slept. I’m not the kind of person who depends on other people I’m the kind of person who tries to take care of everything without disturbing anyone. But things were starting to change this month. I learned that asking for help is not a sign of weakness but a sign that you are allowing someone to care for you.

And so, looking ahead towards the next months, I do not want to rush things. I would like to give myself time to evolve as a creator, to attempt new things, to experience the tools I love and learn from the people around me. I would like to get organized with my documentation, to craft stories with the pictures and drawings that I take, and to develop a workshop to suit the way that I think and not the way that other people think I should.

What I look forward to the most is the community I have found at this very place. The people that brought me into community in the sense of community that includes people even when I am not at the peak of my abilities, but when I’m tired, and sometimes confused, and even overwhelmed. This month has taught me much more than any skill whatsoever.

And if this is only the beginning, I'm thankful for all the good that’s yet to come

This monthly report was written by Mohamed Eddaif, our Moroccan volunteer taking part in a six-month Arts Lab 7.0 mobility, co-funded by the European Union under the European Solidarity Corps.