ROOMS

In the sculptural video-installation Ode to Creode,  video, sculpture and an invitation to sing is gathered in a quest to dream forth new landscapes – both inner and outer, human and more than human. Following the theory of the biologist C.H. Waddington (1905-1975)  as he laid the ground for epigenetics and evolutionary developmental biology. Ode to Creode follows his vision of the creode, a  neologistic portmanteau coined by Waddington to represent the developmental pathway followed by a cell as it grows to form part of a specialized organ. In this metamorphic vision, Waddington asks us to imagine a number of marble balls rolling down a hill. As the marbles will affect  the grooves on the slope, and come to rest at the lowest points. These points represent the eventual fate of the different cell, showing us the cellular developmental process. Emphasising that evolution mainly occur through mutations that affect developmental anatomy.
The two sculptural works, Y-OtC (2022) and X-OtC (2022) invite us on a journey of mutated chromosomes suspended in time and space. Magnified in size, these sculptures call forth our imaginative and speculative abilities. For if we were giving birth to a new tomorrow, what mutated future would we wish for? The video work O-OtC (2022) with its dreamlike logic insist that our ability to associate naturally create temporal correspondences. A cultural transmission chain that invite the viewer to sing. The installation in its invite the visitor to move around in the space, joining the spinning sculptures all awhile the video work tells its surreal story of mankind only to be broken up by an archival song of movement, mutation and imaginings. 

O Sing _ Ode to Creode (oSOtO) 2022
HD video, 10:47 min loop with sound.
Dimension variable.
Cinematographer: Troels Rasmus Jensen, DFF
Colorist: Olesya Kireeva
Gaffer: Malik Thomas
Performers: Dorte Bjerre Jensen, Elijah Nagady, Kasper Jensen, Pierre Enaux, Snore Elvin
Styling og set-design: Nanna Rosenfeldt-Olsen
Costume: Prisca Vilsbol
Digital Post Production – Nordisk Film Shortcut
In-house Post Producer – Maggie Winther Hansen

X ODE TO CREODE (XOtC) 2022
164 x 158 x  72
Sand, paint metal, polystyrene, marble balls.

Y ODE TO CREODE (YOtC) 2022
164 x 60x 55 
Sand, paint, metal, polystyrene, marble balls.

In Selva of Selves (S.O.S) we journey down through a liquid substance and encounter the sea-slug and famous laboratory animal, Aplysia Californica. Used in scientific tests, Aplysia Californica, has helped pave the way for a deeper understanding of how human memories are created, supplying new information about memory storage, plasticity and even memory transfer. The special combination of the sea-slug’s simple nervous system, extraordinarily large sized neurons as well as its fascinating self-defense mechanism, a fuchsia-colored chemical liquid, makes it a powerful organism for us to learn from and with.

In Selva of Selves (S.O.S) we make a shift in perspective, as we in an almost Alice in Wonderland like fashion, disappear down through the opening of the slug’s siphon, arriving deep inside its pulsating nervous system. Thus, in a merge between art and neuroscience, the work opens up to a third space of perspective taking. A space of co- evolutionary imaginings – a space on the erogenous limits of perception and cognition.

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 as a way to remember a more sustainable future.

Credits:  Concept and direction: Helene Nymann, Cinematographer; Troels Rasmus Jensen, Sound: Jeppe Brix,  Set-Design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer, Animation: Adam Ryde Ankerfeldt  & Magnus Pind Bjerre, Colorgrade: Olesya Kireeva, Act3 

The constellation of works
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, cyber chrome, 90 cmx5 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

I

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,
Set-Design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer,  
Sound: Jeppe Brix

The constellation of works (in order of appearance)
Whether We Are, 16:9 Hdv [10:10 min loop] Excerpt from video-work: https://vimeo.com/154560667

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.

Credits: Directed, filmed and edited: Helene Nymann, Medusa: Diana Ø Tørsløv Møller, Set-design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer, Sound: Jeppe Brix

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 [07:50 loop]Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/140426384

HELL FLOWER
(2014)

In May 2012 a woman enters an old abandoned colonial hotel next to Tahrir Square. Shelter and battleground, the past and the haunting social forces, where one space transforms another, the wandering from room to room, the looking and being looked at, a revolution and a constant search for what needs to be exorcised in order for it to grow. The Liberation Of Squares is a split-screen projection with sound, a screen-work as well as a projection on fuschia-coloured fabric. The works are seen as video-sculptures and the immersive sounds emminating from the works encapsulate the viewers as they wander the space, emobodying the woman. Thus, as we follow the woman from room to room, the mental and physicality of the space interchange. 

Credits: Directed, filmed and edited: Helene Nymann, Dancer: Karima Mansour, Set-design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer, Sound: Jeppe Brix

Constellation of works (in order of appearance)
Triptych, 3 x silk-laminated c-print mounted on board.C-Print 70 x 90 cm
The Liberation Of Squares, 2 x channel video sculpture 16:9 HDV [10:39 min loop]
Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/106465869
Balcony, Video-sculpture. Projection on fuchsia coloured fabric. 16:9 HDV [02:23 min loop]
Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/106423293
Chair, 2014
Video-sculpture, 16:9 HDV, (03.23 min loop)  Excerpt from video-work https://vimeo.com/106468620