INSOUL – animated video
05.09. – 28.09.2014
Ed Atkins, Nathalie Djurberg, William Kentridge, Agnieszka Polska, Andro Wekua
Lavra City Gallery, Kyiv, Ukraine
curated by Office for Art
A selection of works by contemporary artists, who use techniques of animation for their moving images.
Since Eadweard Muybridge (1830 – 1904) deconstructed the dramatics of motion sequences into single frozen moments with means of photography and technical inventions, like the high-speed shutter, since Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks (Ubbe Ert Iwwerks) developed sophisticated means to create the visuall illusion of movement out of single drawings and illustrations, since the digital revolution made it possibel to invent whole virtual universes and artificial world constructions, artists have been intrigued by these means, and – left them very often to the commercial world of Hollywood or Bollywood, to cinema and film distribution.
The world of the fine arts institutions, contemporary fine arts museums, galleries, and collections did not take notice for a long time. Only with the growing use and acceptance of film and video in the late 1960s, initially with the documentation of performance work, the medium of the Moving Image entered into the history of contemporay fine art and became an excellent tool for artistic expression and a normal part of international fine arts exhibitions.
During the last two decades classical, analog animation technique became available and accessible to artists without being dependent from large film studios.
William Kentridge (*1955 in Johannesburg, South Africa) creates intensive visual narratives with the manipulation of black chalk drawings and step-motion camera.
Nathalie Djurberg (*1978 in Lysekil, Sweden) brings her creatures into live by using clay-animation and comments in her work on the many psychological profoud abyss in human life.
Agnieszka Polska (*1985 in Lublin, Poland) recreates with the means of digital animation out of printed matter and illustrations her historic telling around forgotten or legendary moments in Polish history.
Ed Atkins (1982, United Kingdom) and Andro Wekua (*1977 in Sochumi, Georgia) demonstrate with their work that digital techniques and artificial, virtual story-telling are not in opposition to artistic quality and the standards in fine arts.
Ed Atkins, Even Pricks, 2013, HD video, colour, sound, 08’00”
Courtesy of the artist and Cabinet, London
On loan from Julia Stoschek Foundation e.V.
Nathalie Djurberg, It’s the Mother, 2008, video, clay animation, colour, sound, 06’00”
Courtesy of the artist and Giò Marconi, Milan
On loan from Julia Stoschek Foundation e.V.
Andro Wekua, Never Sleep with a Strawberry in your Mouth, 2010, HD video, colour, sound, 15’00”
Courtesy of the artist and Gladstone Gallery, New York
On loan from Julia Stoschek Foundation e.V.
William Kentridge, Felix in Exile, 1994
Video projection, colour, sound, 08’43”
Courtesy Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
Agnieszka Polska, The Forgetting of Proper Names, from series Three Videos with Narration, 2009, animated video, colour, sound, 03’45”
© the artist, courtesy ŻAK | BRANICKA
Agnieszka Polska, My Favourite Things, from series Three Videos with Narration, 2010, animated video, colour, sound, 05’35”
© the artist, courtesy ŻAK | BRANICKA
Agnieszka Polska, Sensitization to Colour, from series Three Videos with Narration, 2009 HD video, colour, sound, 05’02”
© the artist, courtesy ŻAK | BRANICKA
Ed Atkins – Even Pricks – video still
Nathalie Djurberg – It’s the Mother – video still