Nathalie Djurberg – Eleven clay animations with music by Hans Berg
Center for Contemporary Art, June 12 - october 3, 2010
Nathalie Djurberg is one of Sweden’s most successful artists today. In 2009 she won the prestigious Silver Lion for a Promising Young Artist at the Venice Biennale for her films and installation The Experiment.
In Djurberg’s intricate clay world, narratives from dreams and fantasies, as well as from the real world, come to life through her use of stop-motion animation. With burlesque aesthetics and humor, she approaches hierarchical power structures, and tabu subjects such as violence, guilt and violation. In the grotesque atmosphere which is created lie both sexual insinuations and ambiguous relationships. Al-though at first sight the animations seem allude to puppet theaters and the naive and harmless expressions of childhood, Djurberg’s films are not made for children.
The artist controls each minute detail in the production process. She commands everything from idea, material, scenography, costume and not least the tense dramaturgy that is reinforced by the handicraft of her film technique. Her collaboration with the composer Hans Berg plays an important part in the final result. His rhythmical film music, like the music for silent movies, pushes the narration forward and creates an extra field of tension.
Most of these films have never been shown in Sweden previously; one has its world premiere in Kristianstad, and for the first time since the Venice Biennale, the films from The Experiment are shown. One of these focuses on a very topical debate about violations within the Catholic church, and exposes structures of power and human decadence.
The installation in Kristianstads konsthall is made according to the wishes of Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg, allowing the music to seep between the films in the dark labyrinth of the exhibition space.
About Nathalie Djurberg
Nathalie Djurberg was born in Lysekil, Sweden in 1978 and is now based in Berlin. Her career has been very successful since she graduated from the Malmö College of Art in 2002. She has already had solo shows in several large institutions around the world. She is represented in Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Malmö Konstmuseum, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Sprengel Museum, Hannover and Media Art Samlung Goetz, Munich. Besides her prize in Venice, she has received the Carnegie Art Award, scholarship to a young artist 2008, Anna Nordlander prize in 2007, and the Beckers art award in 2006.
Many thanks to Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg, Fredrik Liew, Zach Feuer Gallery, New York and gallery Giò Marconi, Milan.
Opening
The exhibition opens at 2 p.m. on June 12, 2010.
More
» Download Fredrik Liew's text from the catalouge (pdf 36 kb)
From the top: Nathalie Djurberg. Still from The Experiment (Greed), 2009. Clay animation, digital video 10:45. Edition of 4. Music by Hans Berg. Courtesy of Zach Feuer Gallery, New York and Giò Marconi, Milan.
Nathalie Djurberg. Still from The Experiment (Forest), 2009. Clay animation, digital video 7:27. Edition of 4. Music by Hans Berg. Courtesy of Zach Feuer Gallery, New York and Giò Marconi, Milan.
Nathalie Djurberg. Still from The Experiment (Cave), 2009. Clay animation, digital video, 6:39. Edition of 4. Music by Hans Berg. Courtesy of Zach Feuer Gallery, New York and Giò Marconi, Milan.
