Oir Art Hub organized its international artist residency on the vast Menen Steppe of eastern Mongolia. Bringing together four international and three Mongolian artists, the residency explored the relationship between landscape, artistic practice, movement, and time through a shared journey across one of Mongolia's most expansive steppes. The journey itself became an essential component of the artistic process, allowing artists to experience the physical and psychological dimensions of the Mongolian steppe before beginning their individual works.

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Reaching the residency site required travelling over 500 kilometres on unpaved roads, with a total journey of more than 40 hours round trip under summer temperatures of approximately 32°C. Long hours of driving across rough terrain became a shared experience for all participants.

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The endless horizon of the Menen Steppe offered an encounter with a landscape unlike any other. For hours, the only visible elements were the meeting of sky and earth, interrupted only by occasional nomadic families, herds of horses and livestock, and distant tracks crossing the grasslands. The scale of the landscape gradually dissolved familiar perceptions of distance and time. The journey demanded patience, endurance, and adaptability. Removed from the pace and comforts of urban life, participants experienced a slower rhythm in which the landscape dictated movement rather than human schedules. These shared challenges strengthened relationships within the group, creating a supportive atmosphere that became fundamental to the residency.

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At the midpoint of the residency, the group arrived at Buir Lake, where participants stayed for several days to develop artworks, conduct research, and reflect on their experiences.

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Encountering the lake after days of travelling through the endless steppe was both unexpected and transformative. Situated within the vast grasslands, Buir Lake appeared almost surreal, resembling an inland sea rather than a typical Mongolian landscape. The uninterrupted blue of the water merged with the equally expansive blue sky, creating moments when the horizon almost disappeared entirely.

The changing light, reflections across the water, fresh green algae, white shells, and subtle shifts in colour offered artists a completely different sensory environment while remaining deeply connected to the surrounding steppe. The lake became another expression of the same landscape. Only the material changed from earth to water, while the experience of openness, silence, and infinity remained.

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Throughout the residency, artists responded to the landscape through installation, site-specific interventions, drawing, video, research, observation, and documentation. Several artists created installations directly within the landscape, responding to the steppe and the lake as active collaborators rather than passive settings. Others gathered materials and developed ideas that will continue to evolve into future works.

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Shared travel, conversations, and encounters with the landscape became as significant as the completed artworks themselves, demonstrating that artistic research can emerge through movement, shared experience, and sustained attention to place.

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The residency resulted in new site-specific artworks and installations, initiated long-term artistic research, strengthened collaborations between Mongolian and international artists, and expanded the understanding of the Menen Steppe and Buir Lake as sites of artistic inquiry. It also fostered strong personal connections among participants, creating an atmosphere of trust, generosity, and collaboration.

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The immense horizon, prolonged travel, changing weather, silence, and physical challenges encouraged artists to reconsider their relationship with landscape, time, and themselves.

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Some experiences require time to unfold. The significance of this residency cannot be measured solely by the works produced during the programme, but also by the lasting influence it will have on the participating artists and their future practices. The journey across the Menen Steppe and the days spent at Buir Lake have become part of the artists' collective memory, leaving traces that will continue to shape their artistic research and creative work for years to come. 

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Curator
Ulziibat Enkhtur

Artists

• Aurélie Cornaz (Switzerland)

• Ariuntuya Jambaldorj (Mongolia)

• Munkh-Erdene Munkhzorig (Mongolia)

• Urangoo Ider (Mongolia)

• Ilgiz Edilson (Kyrgyzstan)

• Eva Slabá (Czech Republic)

• Carla Rump (Netherlands)

Documentation & Logistics

• Enkhsuren Erdenebat

• Unurbat Enkhtur 

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Following the residency, the international artists visited exhibitions, museums, and other artistic and cultural sites in Ulaanbaatar, providing further opportunities to engage with Mongolia's contemporary art scene and cultural heritage.

To conclude the programme, Oir Art Hub organized a public artist talk where participants presented their artistic practices, shared their experiences of the residency, and reflected on the works and research developed during their time on the Menen Steppe and at Buir Lake. The event created an opportunity for dialogue between the artists and the local public, extending the residency's exchange beyond the field and into the wider artistic community.