Nina Beier and Marie Lund

PDF: Portfolio
PDF: Bio

-----------------------------------------------------------

News:

Current exhibitions include:

-'Past Forward' at 176 in London

-’Presence’ at Tony Wight Gallery in Chicago

-'Participation' at Galerie Martin Janda in Vienna

-A trilogy of events at the ICA during the exhibition 'Nought to Sixty', London

Upcoming solo exhibitions:

-'A Circular Play', Wako Works of Art, Tokyo, June

-Laura Bartlett Gallery, London, Sep

-'All the Best', Oneoneone, a solo show curated by Vincent Honoré turning into a groupshow curated by Beier and Lund, London, Sep

-’Good Fences, Good Neighbours’, double show with Chosil Kil, Galleri Opdahl, Stavanger, Sep

Upcoming group exhibitions include:

-’Weisses Lächeln’, groupshow, Croy Nielsen, Berlin, June

-’Notes Concernant les Objects qui sont sur la Table de Cuisine’, guest in show by Sean Edwards, Super, Paris, June

-'Eurasia', MART Museo di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto, July

-'U-TURN', Quadriennale, Copenhagen, Sep

-'Playtime’, groupshow curated by Mélanie Bouteloup and Grégory Castéra, Betonsalon, Paris, Sep

-'Behind’, groupshow curated by Ilaria Gianni

Monitor Gallery, Rome, Sep

-'Platform Seoul', Contemporary Art Festival, Seoul, Oct

Artfairs:

Art Athina, Laura Bartlett Gallery, Athens, May

LISTE 08, Laura Bartlett Gallery, Basel, June

ABC, solopresentation, CroyNielsen, Berlin, Sep

-----------------------------------------------------------

About

‘The work of Nina Jan Beier and Marie Jan Lund derives from a shared fascination with group dynamics and the relations between people, be they awkward, fervent, polite or tender. Through creating situations with a simple set of instructions, the artists play with social customs and allow instinctive human reactions to be observed in their plainest form.

A carefully constructed wooden container encloses a small collection of books. When Nina Beier’s mother moved in with her husband in 1972, those were the duplicates that overlapped between their two collections, and Nina’s mother reasoned to store her copies in the attic. Entitled The House and the Backdoor, the container makes tangible the experience of safeguarding individual identity in a relationship, while this one in question has survived more than three decades. The books are standard paperbacks of the must-reads of the time: Steinbeck, Miller, Kerouac and ‘Quotes of Chairman Mao’ - all in Danish. Their content, and the sealing of them as a finite ‘unit’ galvanizes their relative blandness as objects, and the emotional distance they convey charges them with symbolic value. The work is available for purchase on the condition that the buyer returns the content of the box, should Nina’s parents ever divorce, a stipulation which makes the object’s status dependent on emotional constancy, in itself a contradiction.

Along with the rest of their work, The House and the Backdoor denotes a curiosity about the nature of commitment, be it on an individual level or in relation to the collective. Reminiscence of a Strike Action is an example of an event-based work resulting in video. Six older revolutionary friends have been asked to keep their eyes closed for ‘as long as everyone else does it’. The situation is documented in a slowly panning close-up, and as the camera moves from one person to the next, the delicacy of ‘solidarity’ is rendered visible on their faces. One pair of eyelids flicker nervously, while another stays resolutely shut. It is ‘one for all’, but someone will inevitably become the strikebreaker. As with other recent work by Lund and Beier, the video is inspired by revisiting the progressive environment of the 1970’s in which the artists grew up. The act of looking back from a solidly present position creates the critical distance necessary to look at the implications of social engagement now and in relation to the imminent future.

In the work The History of Visionaries, a young, newly reformed socialist is paid a salary to be present at different times throughout the exhibition to discuss his conviction with any person who might approach him. The visitor will have been prompted by a written sign in the gallery booth, and by recognizing the visionaries’ chequered trousers that match the solitary jacket having been parked on a hook on the gallery wall. For the artists, the acute visionary conviction points towards an idealised past, as well as very visibly (and audibly) pronouncing the agency for times to come. Marie Lund and Nina Beier's work is conceptual above medium specific, and with a new publication designed by Åbäke, their actual, realized work is interwoven with a series of projects to be realized in the near future, as well as work that might only ever exist in imagination. As such, their work traces a series of keyholes, through which we can peep into a bigger history. Just as the principle of exquisite corpse, which the artists have used to produce a series of watercolours: these point to the close collaboration between the two, but moreover to the Surrealist idea of poetry that taps into the unconscious ‘mental contagion’ of the group.’ 

Introduction by curator Cecilie Nusselein Gravesen

.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'The Points ‘Der Konservativismus der Kritischen Theorie’'
'The Points ‘The Significance of the Existential Movement’'
'The Points ‘System-überwindung Demokratisierung Gewaltenteilung’'
Cutout from book cover, 20,5 x 14,2 cm - 18,5 x 11,5 cm- 20,2 x 12,2 cm, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Difference between Humans and Walls
A group of uniformed employees of a museum are asked to stand,
blocking different passages in the exhibition. When a visitor asks
to pass, they disperse and regroup somewhere else.

Event, various durations, Tate Britain, November 2007

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I Wrote this Song for You
The artists have composed a song. A number of people are recorded
singing along, on the first time hearing it.

From 'Participation', Gallerie Martin Janda, Vienna, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The House and the Backdoor
Since Nina’s mother moved in with Nina’s father in 1972,
she has kept a box in the attic, of those of her books that
overlapped with his collection. The artists have built a
wooden container for the books, which is for sale on the
premise that the buyer will return its contents to Nina’s mother,
should she ever again have to make a home of her own.

Wood, glue and varnish, 18x25x35cm, 2007

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

All the People at Tate Modern (Clap in time)
The employees of the museum are asked to stop what they are doing
and start clapping at a given time during the opening hours.
Visitors chose to either clap along or be clapped at.

As part of event programme 'Actions and Interruptions', 2007

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'All the Lovesongs'
Speakers, glue and and any song about a relationship, 2007

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Reminiscence of a Strike Action
6 old revolutionaries have been asked to keep their eyes closed
for as long as the others still do it. The situation is documented in
a panning close-up, exposing the efforts to stick to the task while
making sure that the others do the same.

Video, 8min, 2007

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From 'Laughing in a Foreign Language', Hayward Gallery, London, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A Circular Play (A new draft for an old script)

A theatre performance is noted down in script format while it is being experienced.

Handwritten manuscript, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'History makes a Young Man Old'
A crystal ball rolled to its destination, 10 cm diameter, 2008

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Les Sabots

Children of the 68’ generation are gathered to make a face towards the camera
for the duration of a roll of film.

16mm film, 5min, 2007 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From 'A Circular Play', Wako Works of Art, Tokyo, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

42
14 dice thrown by the artists hitting the sum of 42 by chance.
When reinstalled the dice have to be thrown until hitting the same sum

14 dice, perspex 10x30cm, 2008

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

'One on One', wood, glue, varnish, 36x8x8cm, 2007

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------