The Blue Parade (What the Body Knows) | Library of Walks – Version 17, Prespes, Greece, 2019
Stefaan van Biesen & Annemie Mestdagh
Materials: textile (blue canvas), black nylon rope, letters, PET bottles

The Department of Fine and Applied Arts at the University of Western Macedonia (Greece) hosts the international meeting/conference “Walking Practices/Walking Art/Walking Bodies.” The event takes place in the Prespes region, a unique landscape shaped by the lakes Megali Prespa and Mikri Prespa. This is also the site of Visual March to Prespes, a long-term walking-arts project initiated in 2007 by the university.

The Blue Parade is part of the Library of Walks, an ongoing project started by Stefaan van Biesen in 1990. Over time, it has taken various forms in Europe and Brazil, often in collaboration with curator-writer/performer Geert Vermeire. For Made of Walking (V) in Prespes, Van Biesen and Annemie Mestdagh created a portable, nomadic library carried collectively by participants.

For the Prespes edition, Stefan van Biesen & Anna Maria Mestdagh designed a mobile archive of knowledge and memory. Carrying it through the landscape becomes both a physical effort and a symbolic gesture, embodying shared experience and embodied knowledge.

The carriers become the artwork: through the shared object—acting as a kind of energetic conductor—they become aware of each other’s presence and form a temporary community. While walking (and during breaks), participants are invited to observe their surroundings attentively and absorb the environment.

The ultramarine blue canvas—its flowing shape referencing nearby Little Prespa Lake and recalling that ancient Greek had no word for “blue”—is carried by the group. It also subtly evokes the journeys and destinies of refugees. While walking, participants collect small meaningful objects from the environment. These items are placed in PET bottles (or, later, glass jars) attached to the canvas, giving the walk a ritual quality and creating an archive of the natural and social identity of the place.

Silence, shared movement, and a collective energetic flow turn the walk into a heightened sensory and communal experience.Lost and found ritual:If someone notices an object they wish to collect, they raise an arm to stop the group. A neighbouring participant briefly takes over holding the rope/handle so the object can be retrieved. Once collected, it becomes part of the traveling archive.

The walk is conceived as an exercise in attention, awareness, and the release of tension. Letters and stories from refugees are integrated into the carried structure and read aloud during the walk. During pauses, participants may also add their own notes, texts, or sketches to the nomadic library.“(What) The Body Knows” refers to the intuitive knowledge and embodied wisdom we carry within us.

Notes: In many traditional Greek villages, blue is believed to ward off the “evil eye” (matiasma).The old Greek had no name for the colour blue.During the walk, PET bottles or transparent reusable bags are provided.

Stefaan van Biesen & Annemie Mestdagh
Members & co-founders of the Milena principle

https://www.stefaanvanbiesen.com/walking.html/

https://www.themilena.com/