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Aernout Mik
16 February-15 April 2007
Camden Arts Centre presents three new films by renowned Dutch artist Aernout Mik focusing on the distribution of power incorporated with his unique sense of absurdity and strangeness. Mik is intrigued by social dynamics and how people behave in groups. From one installation to another he manipulates the audience’s experience of the films by changing their physical relationships to how the films are displayed.
A new commission Shifting Sitting (2006) is of a mock judicial trial. Based on contemporary political situations, this staged documentary suggests it is a rehearsal for something else. The shifts of energy throughout transform the space from one extreme to another. It will be presented on a series of screens, mounted in an architectural construction.
Training Ground (2006) is a simulation of a police training arena that slips between uncertain acting and brutal reality. The fact that the police are wearing civilian clothing is disturbing in its ambiguity – transporting them from law enforcement role to one of aggressor.
Vacuum Room (2005) shows scenes from a political assembly which descends into chaos when disrupted by a group of young protestors. The whole ensemble threatens to disintegrate at any moment. Presenting six different views of the same event, it will be shown in an intimate and enveloping context.
Mik’s installations combine performance with the techniques of the sculptor, appropriate for an artist whose first films included live elements. As is usual in Mik’s often hilarious scenarios, there is no classic cinematic narrative or sound, encouraging us to make our own assumptions about what might be going on and how the action is going to be resolved.
Camden Arts Centre is publishing a catalogue in association with Kunsthall Bergen, Norway; Kunstverein Hannover, Germany and The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh which will include an interview with Aernout Mik.
This exhibition is also showing at The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh 19 May – 15 July 2007; Bergen Kunsthall, Norway September-October 2007 and Kunstverein Hannover December 2007-February 2008.
Notes to Editors:
Press View: Thursday 15 February 2006 4.00-6.30pm, talk at 5.45pm.
Camden Arts Centre is a venue for contemporary visual art and education, where ideas are made visible and people of all ages and abilities can engage in the creative process of making art. Our pioneering and varied programme of artist-led courses and other education activities has gained an international reputation as a model of good practice. We are known as a forward-thinking organisation where artists and others can see, make and talk about art.
Aernout Mik, born 1962 Groningen, Pays Bas, lives and works in Amsterdam and has been showing his films regularly throughout the world over the past 12 years, winning the Dutch National Heineken Art Prize in 2002 and shortlisted for the Blue Orange Prize in 2005. In 2005 he exhibited Vacuum Room at Argos, Brussels, Belgium and Centre pour l’image contemporaine, Geneva, Switzerland; he ! exhibited Refraction at New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, USA and Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, USA. In 2006 he showed at UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Galleria Massimo de Carlo, Milan, Italy; Basis voor actuele Kunst, Utrecht and The Netherlands, and Galleria Civica di Arte Contemporanea, Trento in Italy. His last exhibition in the UK was at the ICA, London in 2000 where he showed his film 3 Crowds. His work is held in public collections worldwide.
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