Fear and Loathing in Copenhagen

Note: these photos are not mine, but I have included them with a source link as a demonstrative tool.

The National Museum of Art in Copenhagen provides an overwhelmingly comprehensive view of Scandinavian (and global) art through the ages. While a thorough account of the museum would no doubt be of interest to some, it is beyond the scope of this review. As such, I invite you to visit and explore the museum in its entirety, but will focus here on observations drawn from only the modern works after 1900. Art is a medium to critique the society we take part in, and by narrowing our view to modern art, we are able to draw conclusions about the state of Danish society today.

            There were three pieces that stood out in particular, each of them dealing in hyperrealism and art as an immersive experience. Aside from construction and form, the common thematic thread between them was an inexplicable sense of unease, like the suspenseful moment in a horror movie before the screaming and the stabbing.

http://www.mynewsdesk.com/se/bonniers_konsthall/images/laura-lima-den-nakna-magikern-the-naked-magician-2008-10-13-14-337481

The special exhibit from Brazilian artist Laura Lima exemplifies this clearly. Entitled The Naked Magician, this work was set up as the multi-room living and working area of an unknown and unseen figure. So much of the absent figure’s persona is on display, and not all of it is positive: tiny details like hidden rotten apple cores show neglect and filth, a magazine with Jackie Kennedy’s face intimates a sense of stagnation, and the sheer amount of stuff in each room suggests a cluttered mental space as well. The eeriness sets in even before the viewer trespasses into such a private space; the impression that the “magician” would not want us there is overpowering. But, perhaps the most off-putting aspect of the piece is the fact that Lima spends her days physically present in the exhibit, making noise and continuously reshaping the space. She never interacts with the audience directly, however. Her visual creation and her performance entangle as she moves freely through the interconnected rooms, always just out of sight. Her shadowy presence accentuates the inherent voyeurism of the piece, reminding us that it is not meant as a random collection of items but the product of a human life. We have a necessity to manipulate our surroundings and in so doing imprint ourselves on our environment. This concept hangs heavy on the exhibit, as we interpret the emotional distress of the magician from the rooms themselves and not the person they represent, despite her presence there. Indeed, the magician exists more in her surroundings than in her corporeal body.

http://www.b.dk/kultur/tre-gange-elmgreen-dragset

            Being the travelling exhibit this piece was presented separately, but there were two others in the modern permanent collection that traded on a similar aesthetic. The piece Please, keep quiet! by Michael Elmgreen and Inga Dragset is a life-size recreation of a hospital room -- oppressively white, with no sound, and claustrophobically closing in on the viewer from all sides. Hyper-realistic sculptures of bed-ridden patients fill the corners of the space and are executed with chilling detail. What makes it especially unsettling, though, is the effort on the part of the artists to place the audience in the theater of the space. For example, there is a mirror on the far wall where the viewer sees his own face reflected, thus becoming part of the piece’s imagery. If ever there was a distinction between observer and artist, it is not present here. There is, however, a stronger clue apparent in one subtle detail: of the four hospital beds in the room, only three contain patients. One is left empty, implying that its inhabitant is up and walking around the room. But, the only person in the room out of bed is the viewer herself, now left with the unnerving realization that she herself must be the fourth patient. Where The Naked Magician is uncomfortable because of the magician’s vulnerability, Please, keep quiet! invites the audience to explore their own vulnerability firsthand.

http://lislegaard.com/?p=164

            The final piece I will address is titled I-You-Later-There by Ann Lislegaard. It too is an immersive experience, tucked behind a corner and filling an entire room. The visuals are simple -- a grey wall, almost like a garage door, and a light that flashes in time with the audio. The audio is a painfully neutral woman’s voice narrating her own actions in excruciating detail as she moves through a mundane day. There is something deeply unsettling about the narration, a quality somewhat hard to identify. Perhaps it stems from the way that we digest media. With conflict and violence so readily available, it seems impossible for a piece of compelling entertainment to be devoid of such flashy gore. To the modern viewer, something so mundane couldn’t possibly be its own piece -- something terrifying must be about to happen. The suspense of not knowing is enough to set anyone on edge. Through this anticipation, I-You-Later-There invokes a feeling reminiscent of the reactions from Americans on their first trip to Denmark. There are so many positive attributes of Danish society, and perhaps that’s the end of the story, just as the mundane day described be Liselegaard never wavers. But the idea that maybe it isn’t and that the scary parts of society are harder to see eats away at visitors from the states.

            All three pieces are successful in their own right and deal with slightly different themes, but they do have quite a bit in common. Firstly, the fact that each fills an entire room sets them apart as immersive experiences. Secondly, they each deal with the concept of vulnerability by placing the viewer in an uncomfortable position, though the source of discomfort does vary. Thirdly, they address the tedium of day-to-day life through the lens of three characters: a struggling performer, a hospital patient and a relentlessly average woman.

Although Laura Lima is not a Dane, all three pieces were curated for a Danish audience. Her inclusion in this list does not detract from any potential conclusions about Danish culture. So what can we conclude when taking these pieces together? It is difficult to draw meaningful conclusions after only a few days in this country. That said, there are certain contradictions between the idyllic stereotype of Danish society and a society that values such dark and vulnerable art.  If Danes live everything out in the open, why would their art have such an obsession with the invasion of privacy? If their healthcare system is perfect, why would there be fear associated with an empty hospital bed? Art is a space for people to ask the more difficult questions about their society and if we want a glimpse into the darker side of Copenhagen we need look no further than the Statens Museum for Kunst.