I entered the elevator that was supposed to lead me to the second floor of the empty department store on Karl-Marx-Str. Green neon lights. Ghost train–like music out of the emergency speaker. I pressed the button '2', and the doors closed behind me.

About 15 seconds later, the doors opened again on the opposite side. What I saw made me feel as if I had fallen asleep in the elevator without noticing and woken up in a dream. An entirely empty floor of a department store revealed itself before me. All windows covered, a handful of red neon tubes hanging from the ceiling, the only sources of light besides the emergency exit signs. I stepped out of the elevator, into the welcoming emptiness. As if I were crossing the threshold into a cathedral.

I heard a drill beat, glanced to the left, where the main part of the Dead God Flow installation was set up: a large black pyramid with built-in benches to sit on in front of a screen that showed Hauntology of an OG and Hyperfate by Christelle Oyiri. A snippet of an IG Live recording was playing when I glimpsed at it: Pop Smoke, microphone in hand, surrounded by a bunch of people, behind DJ decks, turning up euphorically to a Nicki Minaj verse.

I paused and observed the room: a handful of people, all standing in front of the screens at both ends of the space [there was a second one on the opposite side, showing another video unrelated to Dead God Flow]. No one in my immediate surroundings.
I slowly walked toward the three benches along the wall facing the elevator and sat down on the one in the middle. Bathing in the neon light that had shifted to green, inhaling and exhaling deeply, the cleansing energy of the emptiness passing through my body, I started to cry. Almost immediately after the tears came, I began to smile, simultaneously. I felt good. I briefly tried to understand the cause of this unexpected emotional eruption but couldn’t find a satisfying answer [maybe just beautiful art?].
I stopped searching and let the feeling wash over me.

The night before, on my way back from celebrating An.’s birthday, I sat on the S-Bahn with Ar. We were talking about our plans for the rest of the weekend, and I told her I would visit Dead God Flow. The conversation somehow turned into her asking where I usually find inspiration for my art. Intuitively, I answered, 'from going on walks alone at night.' Ar. had to change trains shortly after, so there was no time to elaborate on my answer.

I stayed on the train. The question and my intuitive answer to it stayed on my mind. The answer I gave didn’t feel quite accurate. Rather dissatisfying.

Definition of ‘inspiration‘ according to Merriam-Webster:

-> inspiration: ‘an inspiring agent or influence’

-> inspiring: ‘having an animating or exalting effect’

-> animating: ‘to move to action’, ‘to give life to’

-> exalting: ‘to raise in rank, power, or character’, ’to induce exaltation’

-> exaltation: ‘an excessively intensified sense of well-being, power, or importance’

-> inspiration: an influence that gives life, moves to action, and induces an excessively intensified sense of wellbeing, power, or importance

Ar.’s question and my answer to it re-entered my mind as I sat on the bench, soaking in the atmosphere around me. The drill beat had stopped, the music had transitioned into ambient soundscapes. It felt as if Christelle Oyiri had entered my mind, taken a little bit of all the different artistic inspirations, output, and visions that had accompanied and shaped me over the last ten years, and sprinkled them into Dead God Flow.

Experiencing this installation, which felt like a potpourri of my creative influences, provided space for my thoughts to connect and to find a more satisfying answer to Ar.’s question, as well as an explanation for my initial intuitive answer that had left me dissatisfied.

The more satisfying answer to the question of where I find inspiration: in my environment. It’s that simple. The streets I walk through. The room I sleep in. The music I hear. The people I see or meet. The videos I watch. Any sort of input that enters my mind can inspire me — potentially. Whatever surrounds me affects my life, and therefore my art. [Or the other way around?] 

But what about my initial intuitive answer?

For the intro track to my 2016 EP LONO, I picked a beat that starts with a vocal sample from the movie The Departed: “I don’t want to be a product of my environment. I want my environment to be a product of me.”

That quote inspired and motivated me to go my own way without thinking or caring about what others might think or do if they were me, and to encourage the people around me to do the same by being a living example.
It came to mind again as I reflected on where I find inspiration, and I realized that the two sentences don’t contradict each other at all. They complete each other. We are always a product of our environment. And for that very reason, we should aim for our environment to be a product of us. To create, curate, and shape it so that it feels right for who we are and who we want to become.

I don’t actively search for inspiration. I build an environment that makes inspiration inevitable. By embracing solitude and emptiness, I create space to observe and process what surrounds me. That’s how I discover what truly affects me, and how to adjust my surroundings so they quietly, continuously, and subconsciously inspire me.
The empty cityscapes I pass through on my solitary night walks are part of that process. They inspire me, yes, but they also help me understand myself. Solitude and emptiness act as catalysts: a filter through which I recognize what belongs in My world and what doesn’t.

How do you recognize what belongs in Your world and what doesn’t?

glg Soda Paapi

I entered the elevator that was supposed to lead me to the second floor of the empty department store on Karl-Marx-Str. Green neon lights. Ghost train–like music out of the emergency speaker. I pressed the button '2', and the doors closed behind me.

About 15 seconds later, the doors opened again on the opposite side. What I saw made me feel as if I had fallen asleep in the elevator without noticing and woken up in a dream. An entirely empty floor of a department store revealed itself before me. All windows covered, a handful of red neon tubes hanging from the ceiling, the only sources of light besides the emergency exit signs. I stepped out of the elevator, into the welcoming emptiness. As if I were crossing the threshold into a cathedral.

I heard a drill beat, glanced to the left, where the main part of the Dead God Flow installation was set up: a large black pyramid with built-in benches to sit on in front of a screen that showed Hauntology of an OG and Hyperfate by Christelle Oyiri. A snippet of an IG Live recording was playing when I glimpsed at it: Pop Smoke, microphone in hand, surrounded by a bunch of people, behind DJ decks, turning up euphorically to a Nicki Minaj verse.

I paused and observed the room: a handful of people, all standing in front of the screens at both ends of the space [there was a second one on the opposite side, showing another video unrelated to Dead God Flow]. No one in my immediate surroundings.
I slowly walked toward the three benches along the wall facing the elevator and sat down on the one in the middle. Bathing in the neon light that had shifted to green, inhaling and exhaling deeply, the cleansing energy of the emptiness passing through my body, I started to cry. Almost immediately after the tears came, I began to smile, simultaneously. I felt good. I briefly tried to understand the cause of this unexpected emotional eruption but couldn’t find a satisfying answer [maybe just beautiful art?].
I stopped searching and let the feeling wash over me.

The night before, on my way back from celebrating An.’s birthday, I sat on the S-Bahn with Ar. We were talking about our plans for the rest of the weekend, and I told her I would visit Dead God Flow. The conversation somehow turned into her asking where I usually find inspiration for my art. Intuitively, I answered, 'from going on walks alone at night.' Ar. had to change trains shortly after, so there was no time to elaborate on my answer.

I stayed on the train. The question and my intuitive answer to it stayed on my mind. The answer I gave didn’t feel quite accurate. Rather dissatisfying.

Definition of ‘inspiration‘ according to Merriam-Webster:

-> inspiration: ‘an inspiring agent or influence’

-> inspiring: ‘having an animating or exalting effect’

-> animating: ‘to move to action’, ‘to give life to’

-> exalting: ‘to raise in rank, power, or character’, ’to induce exaltation’

-> exaltation: ‘an excessively intensified sense of well-being, power, or importance’

-> inspiration: an influence that gives life, moves to action, and induces an excessively intensified sense of wellbeing, power, or importance

Ar.’s question and my answer to it re-entered my mind as I sat on the bench, soaking in the atmosphere around me. The drill beat had stopped, the music had transitioned into ambient soundscapes. It felt as if Christelle Oyiri had entered my mind, taken a little bit of all the different artistic inspirations, output, and visions that had accompanied and shaped me over the last ten years, and sprinkled them into Dead God Flow.

Experiencing this installation, which felt like a potpourri of my creative influences, provided space for my thoughts to connect and to find a more satisfying answer to Ar.’s question, as well as an explanation for my initial intuitive answer that had left me dissatisfied.

The more satisfying answer to the question of where I find inspiration: in my environment. It’s that simple. The streets I walk through. The room I sleep in. The music I hear. The people I see or meet. The videos I watch. Any sort of input that enters my mind can inspire me — potentially. Whatever surrounds me affects my life, and therefore my art. [Or the other way around?] 

But what about my initial intuitive answer?

For the intro track to my 2016 EP LONO, I picked a beat that starts with a vocal sample from the movie The Departed: “I don’t want to be a product of my environment. I want my environment to be a product of me.”

That quote inspired and motivated me to go my own way without thinking or caring about what others might think or do if they were me, and to encourage the people around me to do the same by being a living example.
It came to mind again as I reflected on where I find inspiration, and I realized that the two sentences don’t contradict each other at all. They complete each other. We are always a product of our environment. And for that very reason, we should aim for our environment to be a product of us. To create, curate, and shape it so that it feels right for who we are and who we want to become.

I don’t actively search for inspiration. I build an environment that makes inspiration inevitable. By embracing solitude and emptiness, I create space to observe and process what surrounds me. That’s how I discover what truly affects me, and how to adjust my surroundings so they quietly, continuously, and subconsciously inspire me.
The empty cityscapes I pass through on my solitary night walks are part of that process. They inspire me, yes, but they also help me understand myself. Solitude and emptiness act as catalysts: a filter through which I recognize what belongs in My world and what doesn’t.

How do you recognize what belongs in Your world and what doesn’t?

glg Soda Paapi