ARS MEMORIA – Memes for Imagination
(2017)
Today, large parts of our memory are externalized into various digital storage channels and images flow at high speeds through our perception, only fleetingly scratching the surface of our minds. Our memory is continuously challenged by new technologies as we have come to trust their functions, we simultaneously abandon our own ability to remember. The exhibition Ars Memoria operates between the pasts and futures of the development of memory-techniques and is inspired by the Italian philosopher, poet, and cosmologist Giordano Bruno. The exhibition Ars Memoria is about our memory’s fragile state, but also about how to activate its potential in a technological world. It presents a set of contemporary artworks and memes to gather new readings of ancient knowledge and memory systems.
Large sculpture
Aom Aom, your body in my room – Study of the hippocampus
polystyrene, metal, white paint,210 m x 150 m x 190 m
Memory Wheels
BE LUCK – Bruno’s Endless Love to a Universe of Circular Knowledge – metal, beeswax, red pigment, cyber chrome, 90 cm x 5 cm
AWAWE – Aby Warburg Arranges a World of Empathy – metal, beeswax, green pigment, cyber chrome, 90 cm x 5 cm
M9MEMM – Mnemosyne and the Nine Muses Entranced in Mnemonic Meditations– metal, beeswax, purple pigment, cyber chrome, 90 cm x 5 cm
TOTHM – Tip of my Tongue to Henry Molaison – metal, beeswax, blue pigment, cyber chrome, 90 cm x 5 cm
AI – All In All In All – metal, beeswax, white pigment, cyber chrome, 90 cm x 5 cm
Video-work
MOL, 11:20 min video loop with sound, single-channel video projection, dimensions variable. – excerpt from Video: https://vimeo.com/241069579
INSCRIBED, OH LOCUS LOCUS
(2016)
In this video-installation, Nymann creates a physical self-awareness in the audience who, as a result of the work’s scale and presence may become participants. In both of these works, the protagonist is a classically trained ballet dancer. The ballet dancer typically works under clear instructions from a choreographer. Nymann, however, circumnavigates these prerequisites by requesting the response to the dancer’s immediate environment and its materials through his unconscious, without a determined outcome. It is here that Nymann explores strategies related to Butoh, a form of dance developed in 1950s Japan, in response to the country’s post-war mindset. Butoh translates from Japanese as “darkness” and is traditionally performed in a slow, unconscious state of expression where past events transform into bodily and cognitive responses.
Credits:
Dancer: Sebastian Haynes . Cinematographer: Troels Rasmus Jensen . Sound: Jeppe Brix . Set-Design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer
The constellation of works (in order of appearance)
Whether We Are, 16:9 Hdv [10:10 min loop] Excerpt of video-work: https://vimeo.com/154560667
Memoria and Other Aftermaths, Flat-screen installation16:9 Hdv [02:46 loop] Excerpt of video-work: https://vimeo.com/212272151
BEHIND THE PICTURE IT WAS
(2015)
The work investigates how the use of archaic imagery and myth, may stimulate the subconscious and evoke a more meditative state of mind. In here marble and myth transcend time and allows the viewer space for retrospection. Metamorphic Rocks, I am no longer afraid, is filmed in Athens, Greece during the economic crisis and follow the craftsmanship of a traditional stonecutter, as he reshapes a massive piece of marble. Through extreme close-ups and with a meditative pace the image follows the breakdown and metamorphosis of this ancient material. Head On My Dear, is based on the ancient Greek myth of Medusa. As the image is endlessly coming and going it questions the value and meaning of our collective understanding of this universal myth, the image, as it is reused and reinterpreted and the power relation of the one looking and the one being looked at.
The constellation of works(in order of appearance)
Metamorphic Rocks, I am no longer afraid,
Video installation Hd 16:9 [04:26 loop] Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/132032628
Head On My Dear,
Video installation Hd video 16:9 [02:05 loop]Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/140426384
