2016, Intervention / Cooking / Talk
Hosted by Arc Residency Romainmôtier/CH
The gift exercise / Invitation 1: Romainmôtier, 2016 (Photo: Willimann/Arai)
Located on a medieval salt trading route and the Via Francigena, an ancient pilgrim from path to Rome, Romainmôtier has always been confronted with visitors from foreign countries. From 2015 to 2018 Arc Residency hosted artists in the former pilgrim hostel of Romainmôtier abbey. During their stay, Willimann/Arai met different local „specialists of hospitality“ (nuns, tearoom owner, mayor, historian and pilgrimage specialist etc.) and learned about christian tradition, the ambiguity of hospitality, the difficulty of receiving a gift, about business and Utopia.
In the end of their stay, Willimann/Arai invited all the 500 inhabitants of the village to be their guests through a personal invitation accompanied by a personal “hospitality gift”. This gift as well as the soup which they served to their guests had been prepared with gifted ingredients they had received from the locals. Printed on doilies hidden under the soup-bowls, the guests could find anonymous citations, which the artists had been collecting during their conversations.