“Although artist Pawel Althamer used the term "directed reality" in the context of participatory art, it is for us the perfect description of how we want to approach our work: Our premise is conceptual and clear, its realisation unpredictable. There is a reciprocal relationship between reality, which is the engine of our work, and our work, which greatly influences and changes reality. Our intersubjective relationship is thus one in which fiction and reality merge.”

In August 2018, Kim and Anyuta got married in the city hall of Ghent in the presence of their parents, friends and family. They married to obtain a residential status advantage for Anyuta, but with the clear intention to establish a sustainable community life. The latter is the most important requirement for a legitimate marriage, according to the Belgian civil code.

“Although we are married, between us, there was no love at first sight. There would have been no marriage without the lines that are currently drawn on the political map of the world, without laws who are limiting human freedom of movement. None of this would have happened, had we not met. We are quite sure though, that within the confines of these circumstances, this time and space, this here and now, we wouldn’t have married anybody else but each other.”

SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY LIVING IS A CONCEPT THAT FINDS ITS ORIGINE IN THE FIELD OF ECOLOGY WHICH INDICATES ALL ORGANISMS IN A CERTAIN AREA, WHERE POPULATIONS LIVE TOGETHER AND ARE ABLE TO INTERACT WITH EACH OTHER. IN SOCIOLOGY, THE NOTION OF SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY LIFE IS DEFINED AS “DIFFERENT SPECIES LIVING PEACEFULLY TOGETHER.”

"Just like any other couple, we try to figure out what we are, what exactly it is we form together? Does it mean you have to tolerate each other in the bathroom at the same time? Is it one person baking pancakes for the other, or making a cappuccino with a failed heart in the steamed milk during quarantine? There is no romantic love between us, but between us, there is understanding, respect, trust and usually a shared sense of humor. There is realistic love between us, as sociologist Eva Illouz describes in The Lost Innocence of Love, or fluid love as philosopher Zygmunt Bauman calls it. Between us there is a focused reality, carefully balanced on the verge of a hole in time.”

The documentation and the experience of our marriage, emerging from this process of forming a sustainable community life, forms the basis of and inspiration for a broad artistic oeuvre of installations, texts, performances, videos and objects. Since our decision to get married in 2016, we recorded, for example, police interrogations, conversations with family, interviews by the migration service, our joint household ... All this together forms a narrative, a report, an archive, but above all a constant questioning of ourselves within the existing social constructions. The work is certainly personal, but as a publicly shared life's work it is also essentially artistic, political, social, poetic.

Extract of playwright A Number of Contradictions, Ignorances and Oddities.
A theatre play/lecture-performance in the making that was tested in Kaaistudio’s during WoWmen 2020

2. EXPLAINING THE CONCEPT

ANYUTA

We are married for real but our marriage is, you could say, one of convenience.

KIM

In the past I obtained a masters degree in fine-arts and an academic bachelor where I majored in theatre science and minored in ethics. Being born here, I have the Belgium nationality.

ANYUTA

I have a Laws degree, a master in Fine Arts and I’m currently obtaining a master in Sociology. 

I was born in Moscow and have the Russian nationality.

KIM

We met in art-school but we didn’t particularly like each other. She was the first person I met that couldn’t stay in Belgium and wanted to. I got very interested in her situation. This idea of marrying each other, slowly started growing in 2015-16.

ANYUTA

First we thought of faking it, then we tried to fall in love for real. But then we thought of an even more intering experiment. In the book of law, a real marriage — as opposed to fictitious marriage — is described as ‘creating and maintaining a sustainable community living’. What this ‘sustainable community living’ means is not further defined in the legal documents.

KIM

But we did stumble upon definitions of ‘sustainable community living’ in the fields of biology, sociology, ecology. On definition in those fields was defined as; different kind of species living peacefully together. So we thought, its perfect, we should make a work out of it. We decided that, in case we would go through the whole administration-migration-process, it would be interesting to be honest and tell migration service we are not romantically involved but we very much so want to create a sustainable community living. Which is the only requirement for a legit marriage. All of this would be documented and these document form the base of our artistic practice. Of which this show is just one example of.  

ANYUTA

On top of that, the definition of a fictitious marriage - according to the book of law - is when you marry only for papers. That we marry also in the name of art makes it fall out of the category of fake marriage. 

KIM

The art is one of the core elements which makes our marriage sustainable, you could say.

ANYUTA

The sustainability of our relationship is mostly due to our art practice yes.. But also, since we make art about our situation our balance is very healthy. It would have been different if Kim just had done this for me. An other reason why we believe our relationship is very sustainable is because we do not plan to ever divorce.

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“Heart shaped opinions” was a group exhibition organised by the bachelors of autonomous design, KASK. Anyuta and Kim were in the same class and Kim was aware of Anyuta’s residential problems. Anyuta had no right to stay in Belgium since she was only here with a student permit. Other long term options to stay seemed impossible. Kim suggested Anyuta to marry so that the latter could stay in Belgium. At this point they were not more than classmates, not even friends. Being artists, they sought for a way to translate their future experience in an artistic practice. Since neither one of them was interested in pretending to be part of a traditional couple they researched what conditions they had to suffice in order to create a legal marriage. The idea to get married got ground here. 

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A small year later, Kim proposed to Anyuta. They deliberately waited to take this step so that they could get to know each other and also create some documentation of their growing relationship in case they would got questioned by the migration service. The proposal was made in croxhapox. Some friends were invited and asked to document the event.

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In June 2017 a presentation was held in Gouvernement during HOOGTIJ/Laagtij festival. the artists explained the project through discussing their marriage contract. A contract that they tried to adjust by making it more personal and telling. In other words, that would reflect the artistic concept and personal preferences. during this presentation they also performed “the most crazy marriage rituals on earth”.

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in November 2017 they were invited by BUDA to present/sell their project at the "market" in Sacrifice, a mini festival that explores the relationship between art and religion. It was a joint project - an Icelandic all-star show - by Matthew Barney. Between the different parts of the festival, the public could visit a kind of communal space, what was called "the market", where projects or companies that work on the basis of similar questions or commitment, present their questions or work to the public. Anyuta and kim explained their project and collected testimonies of the audience on their experience with relationships and sustainability. 

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On Valentines day 2018 Kim and anyuta did a similar presentation for Kni/p Collective in Brussels. here, once more, they held conversations with visitors about their plan to marry and the conditions of their marriage. They asked the audience to tell how do they felt about the project and what real love and legal marriage ment to them. these and other reactions are documented and might be used in a future publication.

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At about 11:40 Brussels time in the city hall of Ghent a wedding ceremony took place. It was shown live in one of the locations of Theater Aan Zee festival. The witnesses put their signatures on the marriage certificate, so did the brides. After that, all the participants and guests moved to the ceremony room where the city advisor on civil affairs informed the brides on their future rights and obligations, made a Polaroid photograph for the family book and pronounced the two wife and wife. Peter Jaquemyn played live music.

The Wedding took place in Ostend at an industrial zone in a building called Hangaar (it was one of the festival's locations). At around 7 pm The Reception started: there were some tents next to a road, cava, snacks catered by Refu-interim and chilling music. One-third of the 120 guests were friends and family, the others were people who bought a ticket for The Wedding (about €40 pp, foods and drinks included). During the Reception a signalling truck appeared. On the platform, there were eight young women dressed in black (two of them were the newlyweds) with black cloths on their faces and with pink signal fires in their hands. The director of this performance, Esther Schelfhout, approached a back panel behind the truck and rolled out a poster with the inscription: I'm just a girl, lucky me. 

Next stage was The Ceremony. Peter — Kim's partner — brought her to the altar and Laura — Anyuta's partner at the time — brought Anyuta to the altar. The ceremony master was Bob Maclaren, a stand-up comedian from New Zealand who's immigrated to the Netherlands. After Bob's speech, the newlyweds exchanged the rings, read the vows and threw the bouquets. The guests were invited to dinner. The tables that were sat at were round, with no sides that can be considered more or less important. At each table, there were pink and white chairs. The pink ones were meant for people who knew the newlyweds personally, the white ones were for the audience that paid a ticket so that each table would have a mixed crowd between family/friends and the audience of Theater Aan Zee.

According to the plan, certain friends and family were invited to give a speech. Not all understood the project's concept. Yet The Wedding was a significant happening to them that asked for articulation. Unexpectedly another participant who brought a speech in the name of the white chairs (the audience who had paid tickets and whom the artists didn’t know personally) interrupted the plan. He held a speech in which he cheered the newlyweds and proposed to introduce the white chair habit to all future weddings. 

The wedding cake is a recognisable wedding element. This cake was almost devoid of decorations. The refusal to embellish reality was an important decision in the design of the whole evening. The core idea of the project is not to decorate or change the world but to try to create a desired reality within the given conditions.

Another recognisable element of a typical European wedding is the so-called first dance. Instead of the traditional first dance performed by the bride and her father, the choreographer Katrien Oosterlinck set up the dance of brides. After, ARIAH LESTER gave a concert that started The Party which was smoothly taken over by DJ Kristof Herbiet. The Wedding was finished next morning at around 6 am.

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During the wedding dance in Theater Aan Zee Anyuta and Kim kissed each other on the mouth. Kim’s boyfriend was really upset about this, because, in his opinion, this project is not about sex and sensuality, and it is not about polyamorous relationships. Kim and Anyuta agreed with his argument and decided to reflect on their mistake in the next work. During Plan B festival they reenacted the wedding dance according to how it could have been more accustomed to the project.

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After the marriage was made official in August 2018 at the town hall of Ghent, an official complaint was filed. The artists subsequently became the subjects of a police investigation set out to examine the sincerity of their marriage. Kim and Anyuta were transparent about their motives. The genuineness of the marriage was considered probable and the file was closed in January, 2019. The material generated by the police investigation became a source for further artistic work. Belgium's marriage migration policy had an active role in shaping both the initial project and the nature of the relationship. The discrepancy between bureaucracy and personal liberty is the subject of Kim’s and Anyuta’s work in progress at Working Title Festival, Brussels, a festival organised by Kaaitheater and workspacebrussels.

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Female Russian Immigrant I Married for Papers and Turned Into My Muse in Order to Build a Great Career, as a Woman by Kim Snauwaert is a work that was first shown at graduation show 2019, KASK. Anyuta lied on a bed copying classical female poses conform to the artistic historical canon; works of Botticelli, Degas, Manet and others. She looked bored and used her smartphone continuously, while wearing a purple dress as a XXI-century muse. Behind her the following text was projected in neon letters: Female Russian Immigrant I Married for Papers and Turned Into My Muse in Order to Build a Great Career, as a Woman. In front of the installation lies a golden publication of the public prosecution file on a colomn, for the audience to browse through. On the bed a book of Proust is displayed, referring to a quote of Jane Birkin: “My mother was right: when you've got nothing left, all you can do is get into silk underwear and start reading Proust”.

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Female Russian Immigrant I Married for Papers and Turned Into My Muse in Order to Build a Great Career, as a Woman by Kim Snauwaert was also shown at WoWmen!2020 festival in Brussels on the 6th of March. 

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A Number of Contradictions, Ignorances and Oddities was shown at the WoWmen!2020 festival in Brussels on the 7th of March. This show is somewhat in between a lecture-performance and a theatershow. We give an overview of the entire narrative. Currently in developing fase. The artists plan to premiere in February and to tour in the season 2021-2022.

1. Installation Between Us and Everybody Else inspired by the police file, Red Star Line Museum, Antwerp. Opening: 25 september

2. Theater play A Number of Contradictions, Ignorances and Oddities, premiere in February 2021, tour in the season 2021-2022

3. Fiction documentary Honeymoon, premiere in BUDA, Kortrijk

4. Sustainable living / house / caban House, collaboration with Plan B

5. Publication, estimated year of publication: 2025