Erkka Nissinen
12 - 18 Mar 2011
ERKKA NISSINEN
12 - 18 March, 2011
Prizewinning new cut of Erkka Nissinens Rigid Regime will be screened this week at Ellen de Bruijne PROJECTS. This work was granted with the Illy prize 2011.
Besides this new cut the following films will be running; The West Project, Vantaa, Night School and The social construction of reality.
On Tuesday 15 March at 13.00 hrs a special lunch talk will be organized with Erkka Nissinen and Bart Rutten, curator at Stedelijk Museum. The lunch and talk are public, so use your lunch break for a ravishing surreal experience in the world of Erkka Nissinen.
The screenings start on Saturday 12 March from 11 am and continues until 6 pm in a loop. This program runs from Tuesday 15 March until Friday 18 March. (The gallery is closed on Sunday and Monday).
Rigid Regime – 2011, Blu-ray HD, 17 min
The West Project – 2010, DVD, 6:28 min
Vantaa – 2007, DVD, 9:42 min
Night school – 2006, DVD, 12 min
The social construction of reality – 2005, DVD, 16:40 min
RIGID REGIME (version 2011) 2011, Blu-ray HD, 17 min
“A pornographic monologue about sense certainty in Hegelian sense’ with ‘a strong home-made look and feel”. The videos of Nissinen are characterized by absurdity, humor and deliberate clumsiness. The protagonist in his work (the artist himself) undergoes extreme scenarios like declaring the world there will be a revolution or having a job evaluation while participating in a porn movie. In Rigid Regime the protagonist simulates two chopped off arms to stigmatize himself. Then he gets kicked in the crotch, a cart drives over his leg, so he has to drag it behind him the rest of the movie and he’s being buried alive by a man who ‘can run very fast’. He claims to accept the situation, is going through the history of mankind and says with the vocabulary of a toddler farewell to life.
VANTAA 2007, DVD, 9:42 min
In Vantaa, a bearded dwarf named after the Hungarian composer Arnold Schönberg (played by Nissinen) who roams through a not so nicely rendered digital village of brightly coloured houses where penisses can be confused with xylophones and flowers can talk, all in search for his stolen yoghurt. The thief, a foulmouthed Karlheinz Stockhausen, has an apoplectic fit and collapses while guzzling a bowl of viscous yoghurt. The singing of animated flowers and neat rows of Crayola-coloured houses recalls the set of an educational program for children, although instants of obscenity bring it closer to Paul McCarthy meets the Teletubbies. Nissinen cleverly implicates composers Schönberg and Stockhausen in “Vantaa”, creating a cultural context while drawing inspiration from the radical originality of both figures.
NIGHT SCHOOL 2006, DVD, 12 min
Nissinen’s inventive and idiosyncratic video work, Night School, provides us a glimpse of a world in which a trio of overweight chefs, a transvestite and an animated panda bear act out disjointed narratives of perverse social interaction. The relentlessly satirical investigation of social behaviour, deviation and transgression is expressed as the intersection between the absurd and the humorous. The skilful integration of animation and actual space and actors in both video works underscores the importance of caricature and parody in conveying any reality.
THE WEST PROJECT 2010, DVD, 06:28 min
The West Project is the artist’s response to the current development of Hong Kong West Kowloon Cultural district. As an oversized developer/architect runs through beautiful landscapes of Hong Kong towards a concrete block surrounded by two women dressed as big feet. West Project written in colourful band around them, announce an event to be started. The oversized developer proclaims to the two big feet that the project is over and they should go home, because it’s dangerous out there. A series of dramatic events turn the celebration into a horror crime scene, leaving the two feet running hopelessly through the mountain.
THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF REALITY 2005, DVD, 16:40 min
The social construction of reality shows a tutorial. This tutorial preaches on sociological themes and brings forward non-visible structures of our social interactions. A man with a moustache and black curly hair lectures on the processes through which we integrate into society. “A body is a problematic object. It has to be washed everyday. It needs a place to live, clothing and food. It needs sex regularly. All this comes with the cost of pain, money and time, in one word: difficulty. And then there is the relationship of a body and the society. One has to exist in a body and a body has to exist in the society. I hope this video helps you to set your own relationship with your body and society into undeniable balance. By watching this video you will become aware of the existence of your social role and how to maintain the impressions you are trying to convey. This video will help you to improve your social performance and you will be able to engage more fluently in various forms of social interaction.” Erkka Nissinen
12 - 18 March, 2011
Prizewinning new cut of Erkka Nissinens Rigid Regime will be screened this week at Ellen de Bruijne PROJECTS. This work was granted with the Illy prize 2011.
Besides this new cut the following films will be running; The West Project, Vantaa, Night School and The social construction of reality.
On Tuesday 15 March at 13.00 hrs a special lunch talk will be organized with Erkka Nissinen and Bart Rutten, curator at Stedelijk Museum. The lunch and talk are public, so use your lunch break for a ravishing surreal experience in the world of Erkka Nissinen.
The screenings start on Saturday 12 March from 11 am and continues until 6 pm in a loop. This program runs from Tuesday 15 March until Friday 18 March. (The gallery is closed on Sunday and Monday).
Rigid Regime – 2011, Blu-ray HD, 17 min
The West Project – 2010, DVD, 6:28 min
Vantaa – 2007, DVD, 9:42 min
Night school – 2006, DVD, 12 min
The social construction of reality – 2005, DVD, 16:40 min
RIGID REGIME (version 2011) 2011, Blu-ray HD, 17 min
“A pornographic monologue about sense certainty in Hegelian sense’ with ‘a strong home-made look and feel”. The videos of Nissinen are characterized by absurdity, humor and deliberate clumsiness. The protagonist in his work (the artist himself) undergoes extreme scenarios like declaring the world there will be a revolution or having a job evaluation while participating in a porn movie. In Rigid Regime the protagonist simulates two chopped off arms to stigmatize himself. Then he gets kicked in the crotch, a cart drives over his leg, so he has to drag it behind him the rest of the movie and he’s being buried alive by a man who ‘can run very fast’. He claims to accept the situation, is going through the history of mankind and says with the vocabulary of a toddler farewell to life.
VANTAA 2007, DVD, 9:42 min
In Vantaa, a bearded dwarf named after the Hungarian composer Arnold Schönberg (played by Nissinen) who roams through a not so nicely rendered digital village of brightly coloured houses where penisses can be confused with xylophones and flowers can talk, all in search for his stolen yoghurt. The thief, a foulmouthed Karlheinz Stockhausen, has an apoplectic fit and collapses while guzzling a bowl of viscous yoghurt. The singing of animated flowers and neat rows of Crayola-coloured houses recalls the set of an educational program for children, although instants of obscenity bring it closer to Paul McCarthy meets the Teletubbies. Nissinen cleverly implicates composers Schönberg and Stockhausen in “Vantaa”, creating a cultural context while drawing inspiration from the radical originality of both figures.
NIGHT SCHOOL 2006, DVD, 12 min
Nissinen’s inventive and idiosyncratic video work, Night School, provides us a glimpse of a world in which a trio of overweight chefs, a transvestite and an animated panda bear act out disjointed narratives of perverse social interaction. The relentlessly satirical investigation of social behaviour, deviation and transgression is expressed as the intersection between the absurd and the humorous. The skilful integration of animation and actual space and actors in both video works underscores the importance of caricature and parody in conveying any reality.
THE WEST PROJECT 2010, DVD, 06:28 min
The West Project is the artist’s response to the current development of Hong Kong West Kowloon Cultural district. As an oversized developer/architect runs through beautiful landscapes of Hong Kong towards a concrete block surrounded by two women dressed as big feet. West Project written in colourful band around them, announce an event to be started. The oversized developer proclaims to the two big feet that the project is over and they should go home, because it’s dangerous out there. A series of dramatic events turn the celebration into a horror crime scene, leaving the two feet running hopelessly through the mountain.
THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF REALITY 2005, DVD, 16:40 min
The social construction of reality shows a tutorial. This tutorial preaches on sociological themes and brings forward non-visible structures of our social interactions. A man with a moustache and black curly hair lectures on the processes through which we integrate into society. “A body is a problematic object. It has to be washed everyday. It needs a place to live, clothing and food. It needs sex regularly. All this comes with the cost of pain, money and time, in one word: difficulty. And then there is the relationship of a body and the society. One has to exist in a body and a body has to exist in the society. I hope this video helps you to set your own relationship with your body and society into undeniable balance. By watching this video you will become aware of the existence of your social role and how to maintain the impressions you are trying to convey. This video will help you to improve your social performance and you will be able to engage more fluently in various forms of social interaction.” Erkka Nissinen