Galerie Dennis Cooper presents … Nina Beier

 

‘Nina Beier’s work is as unstable as a keg of dynamite, if a whole lot quieter. The Danish artist’s sparse, pared-down offerings have included fading photographs, a wall painting that was redone daily and a sculpture recreated via a game of Chinese whispers. Her Dust Painting is literally a pile of dust-coloured pigment, which gets traipsed all over the gallery on the soles of people’s shoes. As unassuming as it first appears, her art is an elusive, restless thing, with scant regard for the beautiful picture frames that often attempt to contain it.’ — The Guardian

‘I believe my father invented Google Maps. Or at least a map of what could have eventually become Google Maps. He never fully realized this project, though. The roads of his psyche, to use a fitting metaphor, were perhaps not made for opposing traffic. People say that every map is a portrait of its maker, a picture of his knowledge, perspective, and interpretation. One thing is certain: My father loves Google Maps.

‘The philosopher Alfred Korzybski famously stated that “the map is not the territory,” supposedly meaning that one should not confuse the representation of something with the actual thing. But there is a lot to be said for confusion. These are confused works, pictures that are both map and territory. What is a poster for an exhibition of posters, or what should we call a representation of dust made of dust-colored pigment dispersed over a room? Or a work that frames the clothes the framer was wearing when he made the frames? After all, isn’t the best way to describe a story to tell one?

‘I have repeatedly come across a Lewis Carroll story about a country that, after several attempts at making an accurate map, makes a map the size of the country itself. But when using it, the citizens run into a number of problems and, following complaints from the farmers who argue that using the map would harm crops, they decide to use the country itself as its own map, a solution they conclude is nearly as good. Here, the represented almost succeeds in becoming its own image, like the story, as I just told it, is almost the same as it was the first time around.

‘When one attempts to light a sculpture fully, its shadows unfold on the floor around it. The sculpture practically appears overshadowed by the repeated figures. But if one would present the shadows as the work of art on display, would we see the sculpture as the portrayed?

‘I have found pictures of body parts belonging to giant statues. These statues are constructed in fragments and will inevitably end in fragments again. They are a puzzle and we know the pieces; even when looking at the full figure, its own reality shines through. As an image torn to pieces and reassembled, it displays the scars of its own history while competing with the story it depicts.

‘The pictures argue within and among themselves, as their surfaces struggle with their content for domination. When a published representation of a work of art is framed and presented as a work again, the weight of the frame might initially outshine its content, which again, if the reflective UV filter makes it survive long enough, might gain enough importance to be appreciated on its own terms and perhaps even be freed from its frame again.

‘The viewer will see her own image mixed in with this story, and any future photographic documentation is likely to include the reflection of its maker. Appositionally, a framed poster that has been sandblasted, obscuring the image and exposing the frame, has become a thing in itself, no longer a representation, and will never again reflect anything.’ — Nina Beier

 

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Further

Nina Beier @ Laura Bartlett Gallery
Nina Beier @ Standard (Oslo)
Nina Beier @ Metro Pictures
‘Of any artist working today, 35-year-old hyper-mixed-media artist Nina Beier …’
‘Artist of the week 180: Nina Beier’
‘FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS’
’25 artists to watch: Nina Beier
‘Nina Beier’s “Office Nature Nobody Pattern”’
Book: Nina Beier & Marie Lund ‘The Object Lessons’
‘Johnson Tiles lends its expertise to artist Nina Beier’
‘NINA BEIER: VALUABLES’
‘ALL THE BEST: NINA BEIER E MARIE LUND’
‘The Pedestal Problem’
Nina Beier reviewed @ Frieze Magazine

 

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Extras

Nina Beier exhibition @ Kunsthal Charlottenborg

Nina Beier, “Men,” 2018

Nina Beier with Marie Lund ‘Hide behind the trees’ (2006)

NINA BEIER, PERFORMER PERFORMING PERFORMANCE (2009/2010)

 

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Interview

 

Let’s start with the basics—your work is so materially diverse. If someone asks you what you make, how do you answer?

Nina Beier: [laughing] Only in America do I get this question! I usually say that my work is conceptually based and takes any form except painting…but I guess that’s not even true anymore. I am wary of self-mediation though, because conceptually conceived work is already far too self-conscious. The art needs to work as a project: to read, to misinterpret, to reinterpret, that’s how you get closer to the idea of a show.

You’ve made some projects that have the possibility of being unfinished forever. How do you resolve to stay unresolved?

NB: My process is coming from a direct frustration—as artists we want to explore something that is alive, but normally in the art system the work is supposed to have a final destination, and it freezes. On the issue of staying unresolved, I guess I am not the first artist to struggle with fitting a living and changing practice into a framework that demands final answers.

So what is your process?

NB: All the things that are completely unbearable about the system, that’s what I want to work with. The artwork is autonomous despite the attempt to claim its rights. When I look at my existing work it is not uncommon that something has changed since it was made; it could be its context, itself or even me. I respect the authority of the [extant] work, but I like to believe that mine trumps it. I should have the freedom to change it. For example, I’ll change a title if I don’t think it’s fitting anymore.

You’ve been quoted as having read the theories of Walter Benjamin and Roger Caillois. Do you think of your work as theory-driven?

NB: I read, but not conscientiously, I have to admit. I use writing for inspiration and I rudely mix and match to make it fit my current thinking. But I would hate to think that my work would be an illustration of any theory.

Do you feel you are playing a game with the audience?

NB: No, a game would imply that I have a master perspective and I don’t want to claim that. My work tends to be built on some more or less logical premise, but it would be really sad if it ended there. I try to start something and there is nothing better than when it is taken on the route of over-interpretation, an attack of the mind, like the incredible places that these guys’ minds can go. It’s what any work of art would wish for.

 

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Show

On the Uses and Disadvantages of Wet Paint (2010)

 

 

Nina Beier with Marie Lund
History Makes a Young Man Old, 2008/2010
A crystal ball rolled on the ground from the place where it was purchased to its final destination

 

 

Tragedy (2012)
Trained dog, Persian rug

 

 

[NO EYES DRY] (2016)
Robotic Massage Chairs, Precious and Noble Metals from Electronic Waste, Dental Industry and Various Currencies

 

 

Sweat No Sweat No Sweat No Sweat No Sweat (2013)

 

 

Shelving for Unlocked Matter and Open Problems (2010)

 

 

Wallet (2014) 
turtle shell, woman/man and kid cotton underwear

 

 

Curly maroon fade pixie (2015)
Short Crop Swoopy Bangs (2015)
Layered Side-Swept Ombre (2015)
Human hair wig, painted frame, framed 64.8 x 41.9 cm

 

 

Nina Beier with Marie Lund
The Collection (2008)

 

 

The Blues (2012)
Sun-faded posters, window glass, frames

 

 

Nina Beier with Marie Lund
I Wrote this Song for You (2008)
8 vintage speakers, amplifiers, soundfile, computer

 

 

Foxtail Keychains, Choker Chain Necklaces, Teaspoons, Chain Print Fabric (2013)

 

 

Untitled (2013)
Woman’s wig, Persian rug, sheet of glass

 

 

Flowage (2013)

 

 

Untitled (2014)

 

 

Untitled (2014)

 

 

Beast (2018)
two motorised rodeo bulls repeatedly perform their act of resistance

 

 

Tunnel Taken Apart (2010)

 

 

The Pockets (2012)

 

 

Greens ($50 rubles) (2014)
Palm and printed towel pressed by glass, on foam on MDF

 

 

Nina Beier with Marie Lund
New Novels, New Men (Jealousy, Jalousi, La Celosia, La Gelosia, Die Jalousie oder Die Eifersucht) (2009)

 

 

Liquid Assets (2013)
plastic, 3D modeling

 

 

Allegory of Charity (2015)
ceramic cups, coffee beans, resin, wood, metal

 

 

Nina Beier with Marie Lund
The House and the Backdoor (2007)

 

 

*

p.s. Hey. This afternoon I’m off to Cherbourg for the Avant Premiere of ‘Permanent Green Light’ there tonight. I’ll be on a train heading back to Paris tomorrow at the time I would normally do the p.s., so you’ll get a p.s.-less post tomorrow, and I’ll see you ‘in person’ again on Wednesday. ** Dominik, Hi, Dominik! I’m happy you liked the post, and I’m even happier that you’re feeling more spry. I can only just try to imagine the complications involved in centering yourself in gender, but maybe the seeming monotone phase is some kind of stillness to allow for regrouping? I don’t know. I’m always drawn toward the optimistic view. Strange of me. I hope you find your own authenticity as soon as you can. It must be intense to be a warrior for yourself without precedent to help guide you, and I guess I try to imagine it’s somehow related to being artist seeking to be truly original but in a much deeper and more thorough way, and I admire the hell out of your belief and strength. Thank you a lot for the Violet Chachki video/link. If I have time before I catch my train, I’ll luxuriate in it, otherwise I’ll do that as soon as I’m re-ensconced in Paris. Unfortunately, we did get the 16+ rating. It’s so bizarre to me. I think the ratings board did not pay attention to the film. Anyway, we’re doing the best we can with it, but our release is being hampered by it for sure, not in Paris but in other, smaller French cities. Oh well, what can you do, you know? There was a big David Lynch exhibition in Paris a few years ago. Some of it was super interesting. I’m not so into his paintings, and there were a lot of them. My week was busy. Close to finishing the latest draft of the TV script, a bunch of stuff around PGL’s upcoming release. I saw a screening of Fellini’s ‘Satyricon’, which I hadn’t seen in decades, and I thought it was so fantastic! It’s hard to believe there was a time when a director would have been given so much money to make something so completely weird. Have a lovely and even amazing time until I get to see you next! ** David Ehrenstein, Hi. Thanks, yeah, the old, or, I guess, not so old days. I’m wishing I was there to see Tim’s new piece. ** Bill, Hi. I was a fellow ‘High Performance’ addict. True, except in extremely rare instances, performance lives and dies in person. I was really surprised at how strong Reza Abdoh’s work was in the surviving videos they showed in his retrospective though. Not a chip off the live experience, but still. Huh, I don’t think I know ‘Blank City’. I’ll hunt it. Yeah, those Poe and Mitchell and so forth films are super charming, but, in memory at least, they are not gods of economy for sure. ** Steve Erickson, Oh, well that’s interesting that he agreed. It’s so true that it’s so easy to fatally send an interview off on a tangent with the wrong question to a touchy subject. For the feature articles for Spin, yes, I usually spent two or three days with the interviewee. It was quite good, except, of course, when the interviewee was a prick, which didn’t happen very often however. Everyone, Steve has reviewed Olivier Assayas’s new one ‘Non-Fiction’ if you’re curious to get a bead on whether it’s worth seeing or want to compare your opinion of it with Steve’s. Here. Oh, I saw the new Frederick Weisman film ‘Monrovia, Indiana’. It’s very good, a real return to form after the labored library film. His best in a while, I think. ** kyler, Hi, K. Awesome if you can see PGL again. Thank you! Obviously I so wish I could be there for your reading and to celebrate your new book! Everyone, if you’re in NYC, Brooklyn, or any of their environs, you have the golden chance to see a rare reading by scribe and our own Kyler James on May 3rd. Here he is to flesh out that alert: ‘Here’s the FB invite for anyone who can see it here. Getting excited, should be a lot of fun, especially if one of the “real-life” characters can come and play herself as the psychic at Raoul’s Restaurant (Chapter 3). She’s not feeling well at the moment, so we’ll see, but I’ve got a couple of short passages picked out that oughta work well.’ It’s interesting and not unsurprising to see that, now that people are reacting to Bret’s book who are actually reading it and not just fantasising about it, there have been some thoughtful, nuanced responses that aren’t just using p.c. talking points as evidence to execute it and him without a trial. I still haven’t read it, so I’m still on the fence. ** Sypha, Well, you definitely made full and very valuable use of your vacation, sir. You make my work busyness seem like sun bathing. Excellent. As usual, I don’t/haven’t watched a lick of GoT, so I’m just watching the related excitement unfold from the peanut gallery. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi. Yeah, I don’t think a lot of people realise that Paul Reubens was a performance artist who did a performance piece that hugely struck gold. Great about the website’s approaching birth, and I’ll keep my eyes peeled for a post wrapped in email. Looking forward to seeing you on Thursday! ** Misanthrope, True. Except in the cases of 100 million dollar budgeted flop super hero movies. And even then they usually just go ahead and throw millions away making the next one anyway. Glad LPS’s mom is gone. Hopefully for quite a while. Best of luck to that rapscallion and you on Friday, man. ** Jeff J, Hi, Jeff! Thanks. No, I think part 2 is the completion. I don’t think there are enough uncovered artists to make another one given that I’m only covering artists whose work I’ve personally experienced. Duncan has done other sound pieces, yes. A number. All are interesting, but none can top that one’s wow factor, but then how could anything? Dalkey let ‘Mobile’ go out of print?! And many others? That’s fucked up. There’s no reason why they can’t just make the books print-on-demand and keep them alive that way. That’s distressing news. Ugh. I’m glad Paris is still haunting you, though. ** Right. Today my galerie presents a show by Nina Beier, an artist I like quite a bit, Give it a tour, won’t you? The blog will see you again tomorrow, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.