Hold the Line is a project created in collaboration between Anna Reihlen, a textile designer based in Paris, and Valeriya Malinova, an artist based in Lyon. This project explores multiple ways of development, focusing particularly on encounters, happy accidents, serendipity, the lines we draw throughout our lives (both geographical and metaphorical, such as the lines on a palm), different trajectories, dreams, imaginations, observations, and languages. It also delves into memories: personal, collective, or even the memory of an object.
Originally from Germany and Russia, they decided to trace an imaginary line from Moscow to Hamburg and to locate its exact midpoint. Using GPS coordinates from Google Maps, 55.542597, 23.554597, they identified this point on the map, which lies in the Lithuanian countryside where they decided to go.
Two distinct fields of creation—textile and image—meet in this project, allowing for experimentation and the creation of a unique fusion.
The book was conceived as part of the exhibition. It was given to spectators during the opening, so they could leave with it, carrying a piece of the exhibition with them.
The book preserves the email exchanges between the two artists and the letters they wrote to each other throughout the project. It also includes the objects they collected and displayed in the exhibition space. The twins, or "Doppelgängers" as they call them, appear throughout the pages, creating a playful connection with the exhibition.
