June 8, 2014 - Gräfelfing

 

I arrived in Munich a week ago. Irmi, a member of Kunstkreis Gräfelfing, met me at the  hauptbahnhof and from there we took the S-bahn to Gräfelfing, about 1 km west of Munich. The town is quaint, scenic, historic, and wealthy; the 5th wealthiest municipality in Germany. Only about 14,000 people live in the town, which is surrounded and spotted with green spaces. It has easy access into Munich via public transport and bike, which I hope to use regularly.

After a very short tour of the town, Irmi took me to meet Manu, my host during the month of June. He is a kind, open personality that I have shared many great conversations with about what seems to be the common topics for this trip: art (he is a photographer), military, history, politics, and food. His English is very good, and he helps me with the German language and all of my questions about it. I have my own room upstairs to sleep and relax in - it has been very nice to slow down since my busy traveling, being able to unpack and live a little more comfortably than I could when hopping around between hostels and trains. I've been getting much more sleep since I arrived - a welcome change of pace.

Manu and I have gone on a few bike rides and he's given me pretty much a grand tour of the small town I now call my temporary home and I have to say that I am very happy I'm not inside Munich proper. The weather has been great and very warm, combined with the proximity to the city makes it feel so easy to get the best of both worlds. Although I haven't made too many visits to see things in Munich yet, I am excited to have some time to do so. As Irmi said last night, this is the calm before the storm. July will be much busier once our exhibition "H2Oh!" opens on the 3rd.

Last Tuesday I attended my first meeting with Kunstkreis Gräfelfing and made all the requisite introductions. Everyone seems wonderfully inviting and excited to have me join them for this exhibition. I can tell that my skills will be best put to use during the installation of the show, as there are a few small projects that will require some hands-on building and creative solutions. The sooner the better, at least from my perspective, as I am eager to start working and accepting responsibilities. The spaces for the exhibition are located in the alte and neue rathouse and provide a lot of wall room for the artists. Filling it all seems daunting, but with the many artists participating in the show I am very confident it will be a well curated event. Watching it all come together will be very exciting, as the work I have already seen is quite impressive.

There isn't a much more settling experience you can have than going to a new market and buying a big bag of groceries for yourself. It is exciting to see the variety and differences between an American and German food store, especially knowing of their tighter laws on food ingredients and preservatives (I haven't seen high-fructose corn syrup in ANYthing here, and I even had to explain to Manu what it was). Coincidentally, Germany also has the lowest grocery prices in Europe. Irmi treated Manu and I to dinner last night at Wilder Hirsch, a traditional Bavarian restaurant and biergarten. I had a great time and really enjoyed my meal, gefüllte schweinelende (stuffed pork loin). I've had many opportunities in Europe to try new food and beer, and it doesn't look like it's going to slow down now that I've settled in Gräfelfing. It seems impossible to try a new brew every day, but that limitation is only imposed by myself and not by the selection available here. I believe I might make a thorough shopping trip to the nearby Getränkemarkt and pick up a case that might last a week or two. 

The amount of work being exhibited in the Munich area is impressive. I believe I could go see new shows almost every night of the week if I had the energy and money to do so. I've gone to two openings so far at exhibition spaces in the city, plus a Kirchner retrospective at the Pinakothek der Moderne, and am making a list of the many more I intend to attend.