Diorama Sanna Helena Berger The edge must be scalloped Sanna Helena Berger... · 1 Sanna Helena Berger: The edge must be scalloped DIORAMA 1 Sanna Helena Berger The edge must be scalloped

1

Sanna Helena Berger: The edge must be scallopedDIORAMA 2016

Sanna Helena BergerThe edge must be scalloped

Diorama

Stian

Sanna

Stian

Sanna

Conversation Sanna Helena Berger & Stian Gabrielsen

Can you give some background on your current show at Diorama, what ideas are in play here?

I would say an array of ideas that culminate in a large wooden structure roughly in the middle. However, the entering of the building is just as important as the entering of the work. Here one of the ideas in play are clearly on display since it greets you. An out of place reception mimicking that of an institutional entrance. A text which is an equal part of my work disguised as a piece of information and a point of authority; A gallery guard or invigilator.

This is the original thought - A mode of viewed viewing. How do we view art when we are either under observation ourselves or observe others observe art?

The reception is simply an introduction to this question and as such; a comment. But it could easily go unrecognised in any other space or gallery. Here it is a jarring element and a clear comment on an institutional standard because of the architecture of Diorama. The remnants of a previous space - a laundromat - with is salmon pink relief wallpaper interior and blue window vinyl exterior. The shape of the door frame leading into the main room is one of my favourite features of the space. This sets the stage very nicely for me to be able to insert a body in the space with a very clear and distinct purpose - a work.

But the idea of ‘a viewing of art’ seems also to be challenged in your work, as you often work with constructing ‘situations’ where there is an uncertainty about what is staged and what is not. The objects or gestures that make up your work sort of meld with the environments that frame them. Can you say more about this stealth aspect? Does it have a strategic purpose?

Yes, ‘a viewing of art’ as you say is something I consider not only a result or natu- ral order of making and showing art but art in itself. For me, it is extremely important to question where the art is? Not only within my practice and the work I make but within the situation and context within which I show.And so naturally I come to examine the viewing of art as an experience, an ac-tion; a work. The uncertainty is not meant to be there to trick the viewer but rather to pose this question or at least open up this form of questioning.

2


3


As you say - my work isn’t as clear as for example with pedestaled or wall hung artworks, it doesn’t give you an immediate safety that an isolated object does.

Here: an artwork!

This is not something I enjoy working towards. My aim is never to let whatever I make be a closed subject, I need the viewer, I consider them a pre existing value in the work that I do. The uncertainty I assume also comes from scenes and en-vironments that feature in in my work where ‘borrow’ from the every-day. And so the leap into abstraction or departure from the ordinary and seemingly mundane is not great enough for it to be an obvious and clear artwork, at least not in a classic sense. It is often rather a familiar scene.

This in turn, I hope, makes the viewing not only objective but rooted in experi-ence.

I wouldn’t want anyone to simply view my work. I aim to make work that can be experienced. I want to leave some things open. I am not sure I would call it a strategy. Maybe rather; a focal point, a ways and means of being able to make work that is not simply seen but develop. That can establish and generate differ-ent results according to the individual visitor. So that the work - the installation - is not the finnished work - I need the people. There can be no completion without the engagement of the visitor. Here I am asking something of them - a work in itself - I ask for interaction. And this makes ‘a viewing of art’ the art.

So the interaction you want is different from viewing and interpreting images; obviously it’s more immersive, and in that sense perhaps more enjoyable, but you also use the term ‘work’, which seems to imply that there is effort involved, an expenditure of energy. Can you say more about the kind of activity your work facilitates and the product or result of this activity?

Yes, I think the two actions; viewing and interacting are two very different terms of engagement. The act of viewing can of course lead to interpretation, question-ing and discourse, but I consider this a multi-faceted result of still a very singular activity - viewing. This is not to say it is lesser in value in any way. Just a different mode of responding to a work. When being asked to partake in a work (in what-ever way that may be) I think there is an immense effort involved, yes, from the visitor. You put it very well when you refer to it as ‘an expenditure of energy’.

I consider it a great ask to consider that anyone would put themselves in a situa-tion where they show up at an exhibition and is asked to carry out an action that the artist has set for them. No matter how seemingly passive; entering a room alone is an ask. Separating a viewer from the safety of viewing in masses with the added safety of a social circumstance and casual environment. It’s a way of making the otherwise optional acknowledgment and conversation to be had about the work in the room a more central dialogue than a social catch-up. I think it is harder to exit a room which you have had to enter alone, where there is a sense of anticipation beforehand and a sense of facit in hand afterwards without a re ection, often shared.

You now know more than the other who has not yet entered the room. And so I think, at least from what I’ve gathered as evidence so far, there is a focus on the ‘effect’ of the work which is stronger than that of a work simply placed in the vicin-ity of the viewer. The act of entering the work is part of the installation.

Stian

Sanna

4


And so why I call it a work is because it is an active ingredient of the installation. The unfolding of the ‘effect’ of the just-post exit that leads to a very different mode of viewing and interpreting. There is no hiding that we have a different (perhaps stronger) experience of a work where we’ve had to involve ourselves actively to be able to recognise it. We are then not conscious only of the work but of our-selves and the role we are asked to play within the work. I guess you can call this a product or results of this kind of activity; a relation between the work and visitor which is strengthened by the act of participation.

Strategies of audience inclusion and participation was central to nineteenth cen-tury avant gardes like Futurism, the Russian Proletkult and Dada. Where do you trace the genealogy of your practice?

I prefer, although there are references to be made and although I am aware of many of them such as the ones you mention above to trace the genealogy of my work back closer to home. As a matter of fact; to home. Maybe it is my schooling, or rather lack thereof, but I prefer to trace my practice back to life rather than back to art. I, of course, am not denying the importance and in uence of other artists and movements. I could mention a handful of artists that apply strategies of au-dience inclusion and participation that I admire and whose work I love. But if we speak about the genealogy of my practice it is deeply rooted in my own daily life and in many cases my childhood.

I am the youngest of four siblings. I’ve often asked my mother what I was like as a child and she always have the same answer. I was the observer and the role player. I would watch my siblings play and then mimic their play as my own often relaying that same play back to them in some kind of ad-hoc homemade one woman (girl) show. This, I suppose is something I still do, especially when including performative element. Study a behaviour or a scene and then remove elements of that and construct a new behaviour or scene in a new context. I think a child’s ability to be avant-garde in the truest form of it’s meaning is very powerful. I constantly play and develop ideas with my nieces who are 8 and 11 and I think their ability to be radical is something that both inspires me and nds its way into my way of thinking about art. A sense of freedom of play that I think becomes limited as we grow up and adhere to references that are tightly knit in a fabric of legacy and a need to justify or specify where exactly our train of thoughts or philosophies behind work comes from. Who has paved the road before me? Many! And they have been catalysts especially at an early stage of any artist development, I’m sure. But to be able to have an original thought I have made the conscious decision to not align my work to a speci c movement or league of artists. But to consider the work a reform (in kind).

Children are aesthetic radicals in a way, they need their interaction with art to partic- ipative, tactile even. The ocular alone is only of limited interest. Would you say that your aesthetics are not only inspired by children, but also cater to them, or to their speci c mode of art appreciation?

Yes, and to develop. I think that it is a shame that we don’t carry on with the up- keep of artistic development and experimentation as we grow older (referring to the gen- eral public, not artists) even though there is clear evidence that it is such an important part of our intellectual development. I guess a lot of people colour in mandalas these days.. Which now sounded like a line delivered down from some kind of ne arts high ground so I would like to clarify that colouring in mandalas is

Stian

Sanna

Stian

Sanna

5


an extremely therapeutic exercise. And that there is no high ground ...

As for my own aesthetics I would love for it to sometimes be a bit more playful and maybe in that way more inspired by children, especially my nieces and neph-ews who are extremely important in my life. I think my work is at times too tight knit in its both referential aesthetics and my own very clear ideas of what is not only a good work but a good looking work. I think this is such a faux pas within the arts, but a completely illogical critique. I don’t see the reason to shy away from aesthetic appeal if the concept is strong. If the concept is weak and only achieves to appeal as a surface or object or stylisted entity then I agree, aesthetics should be secondary to an original thought.

But I don’t think it should be disregarded to achieve an assumed gravitas. Maybe again, here it is a matter of schooling that I lack and therefore my self-taught ap-preciation of aesthetics is guess is somewhat less vili ed than of those that have been hounded by tutors who apply anti-aesthetics as a guideline for a good work.However within the rules of aesthetics that refer to establishing the meaning and validity of the work then yes - I would love for my work to appeal to children. In fact the rst visitor I had entering “The edge must be scalloped” except for those who helped me build it, was a child. I was one the other side looking at him. He didn’t know I was there. He was very still in there but when I made myself known he rushed up to the mirror / glass and cupped his hands around his eyes to look through. Of course completely destroying this instinct to peek through I called out “No!”. Because the mirror / piece of glass in the middle was quite precarious sim-ply from the construction limitations to make it solid, and so, unfortunately ruined this moment of a child’s instinct to be curious.

I would have loved to let him play without practical boundaries within the space.The key word of play and so the in uence of child-like behaviour in my work does exist. This is very much something I would like to explore more and more and as I consider my work developing, which is something I gradually steer towards making work in public spaces. A work for all; a true form of interaction. A work that doesn’t necessarily have to only live within the tight knit structure of ne arts but in the public space. Which cannot break at the rst point of play and which does not limit its appeal to a certain age group with a certain base knowledge or appreciation for the arts.

I went to Brussels a few years ago as part of a roadtrip to visit WIELS and Franz Erhard Walther’s oeuvre exhibition. I am in awe of his ability to make work that so easily appeals to anyone with an ability to let their playful self enter the otherwise usually very elitist site that art lives within. Here a family was playing with the big sheet of muslin that folds out to a large rectangle whose sewn pockets you can get into as a sack when standing and as a sleeping bag when lying down. And there were these children crawling in and out. For me it was a really important moment. Something I think about a lot, not only as a memory but as a standard that I think is very high when I think about interactive work. So simple yet so, risking sounding romantic, beautiful.

6


7


8


9


10


11


Documents

Diorama Sanna Helena Berger The edge must be scalloped Sanna Helena Berger... · 1 Sanna Helena Berger: The edge must be scalloped DIORAMA 1 Sanna Helena Berger The edge must be scalloped