Bergstraße 78

Created while studying at UCLA

TV monitor, bed sheets, acrylic markers, personal objects

June 2023

The work consists of a single channel video and installation exploring the importance of language to one's sense of self and ability to connect with others. Drawn from her experience of being half-German and her relationship to her family, Müller considers ideas of identity, communication, and the unreliability of memory. Having been brought up in the UK, her first language is English and her only connection to Germany is through visiting and speaking with her family. Due to the loss of family members and the impact of Covid-19, among other things, she travels to Germany and sees her family less, impacting her German language abilities. The work acts as the start of a process of reconnection to her nationality and way to explore the love she has for her family and how it is remembered, shared, and complicated by language.

At the centre of the installation is a video using the typing of a letter to the artists' family as a through line. The format of a letter explores how language connects us to others. At the centre of this connection is the ability to express oneself accurately: to understand others and to be understood in return. The speaking of two languages often requires a process of translation that can create losses in meaning. The omission of the words written in the letter makes the subject of the work the grammatical and spelling error lines that slowly build throughout. These lines are something we have been conditioned to want to fix and they create the central tension in the work around ideas of mistranslation and miscommunication. They function as a visual material for Müller to explore the loss of language skills and the effects this can have on being understood and the sense of one's identity within a given nationality and family.

Connection and family are lauded and honoured through the collection of objects and family photos in the work, while ideas of distortion and disruption are all created by the video and sound work. The process of switching between languages takes time and effort which can create mistranslations and a 'computing error' in the brain. These ruptures in translation and communication are visually represented by the grammatical and spelling error lines and also sonically with glitches. These glitches help to consider the tension between what is meant and what is said. Whilst language is gradually being lost for Müller, the work does not give up hope. The installation is part of the process for her to reconnect with her nationality, family, and identity through the piecing together of her memories surrounding the love for her family.

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The intention of my communication.

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Longing