EXPORTABLE GOODS DANISH ART NOW AVPD, BANKMALBEKRAU, RASMUS BJØRN, PETER CALLESEN, TROELS CARLSEN, ELMGREEN & DRAGSET, NILS ERIK GJERDEVIK, JEPPE HEIN, INGEN FRYGT, HENRIK PLENGE JAKOBSEN, JESPER JUST, JOHN KØRNER, JULIE NORD, PARFYME DELUXE, TAL R, TORBEN RIBE, KIRSTINE ROEPSTORFF, PIA RÖNICKE, MORTEN SCHELDE, ANDREAS SCHULENBURG, KASPER SONNE, SUPERFLEX, CHRISTIAN VIND; KRINZINGER PROJEKTE EXPORTABLE GOODS DANISH ART NOW AVPD, BANKMALBEKRAU, RASMUS BJØRN, PETER CALLESEN, TROELS CARLSEN, ELMGREEN & DRAGSET, NILS ERIK GJERDEVIK, JEPPE HEIN, INGEN FRYGT, HENRIK PLENGE JAKOBSEN, JESPER JUST, JOHN KØRNER, JULIE NORD, PARFYME DELUXE, TAL R, TORBEN RIBE, KIRSTINE ROEPSTORFF, PIA RÖNICKE, MORTEN SCHELDE, ANDREAS SCHULENBURG, KASPER SONNE, SUPERFLEX, CHRISTIAN VIND; KRINZINGER PROJEKTE KRINZINGER PROJEKTE TABLE OF CONTENTS HOW TO DEFINE A SCENE 5 JESPER N. JØRGENSEN THE PROTAGONISTS OF A SCENE 11 SEVERIN DÜNSER AVPD 22 BANKMALBEKRAU 24 RASMUS BJØRN 26 PETER CALLESEN 28 TROELS CARLSEN 30 ELMGREEN & DRAGSET 32 NILS ERIK GJERDEVIK 34 JEPPE HEIN 36 INGEN FRYGT 38 HENRIK PLENGE JAKOBSEN 40 JESPER JUST 42 JOHN KØRNER 44 JULIE NORD 46 PARFYME DELUXE 48 TAL R 50 TORBEN RIBE 52 KIRSTINE ROEPSTORFF 54 PIA RÖNICKE 56 MORTEN SCHELDE 58 ANDREAS SCHULENBURG 60 KASPER SONNE 62 SUPERFLEX 64 CHRISTIAN VIND 66 IMPRINT & CREDITS 68 3 HOW TO DEFINE A SCENE JESPER N. JØRGENSEN What is Danish art and how can the The exhibition Exportable Goods – Danish notion of nationality Possibly serve as a Art Now seeks to Present a wide range Parameter for an exhibition of contem - of artists coming out of Denmark, cho - Porary art these days? Is it interesting, sen on the basis of citizenshiP and rela - or even Possible, to determine certain tionshiP to the local art scene. Due to local and national traits in the artworks the above-mentioned isolating tenden - and Practises of artists coming out of a cies and a Poorly develoPed institutional country so unmistakenly conform with a framework, the scene has not been able (western) EuroPean and international to attract many foreign artists that have community? One the one hand, the coun - left a mark or been a natural integrated try is so small, marginalised and in many Part of the artistic milieu, so it would not ways isolated that there actually could make sense to try to go beyond the be certain national characteristics in the notion of citizenshiP. Instead the exhibi - visual arts. But on the other hand - due tion and the artists are viewed through a to the same basic conditions - the Pro - filter of internationality. By Presenting a fessionally working artists have inevitably cross-section of artists from the well esta- been forced to break out of this strait- blished ones with an international career jacket, seemingly self-imPosed by the to the younger uP-and-coming, the Political and artistic milieu, and merge exhibition will sPan the artistic milieu with an international scene to challenge over a decade from the late nineties uP and imProve themselves and their work. to the Present time. The selection of So where does this scenario leave an artists is motivated by their orientation exhibition like Exportable Goods ? E ven towards an international scene through though the Parameters of nationality have active ParticiPation and a high degree of to a great extent been exhausted within mobility between the national and inter - exhibition Production in the art world at national milieu. Over the Past decade, large over the Past ten to fifteen years, this movement has been the common the exhibition still insists that the notion denominator for the artists and for the of nationality can serve as the starting local scene itself. In many ways one Point and as a framework for Putting an could argue that the scene was, and still art scene into PersPective. And PerhaPs, is, to a great extent defined by migra - more imPortantly, disPlay the mecha - tion: the internationally best-known reP - nisms of how the art scene is defined. resentatives of »Danish Art« are the ones that left Denmark and out of necessity established their careers abroad. 5 The Danish art scene has gone through number of Professional young galleries a massive develoPment since the early oPening, which together with Wallner and nineties. Back then, aPart from a small Stærk galleries and the Susanne Ottesen selection of traditional and somewhat Gallery, are rePresented through their conservative museums and galleries, artists in this exhibition. These include the scene was driven by artists’ own ini - Bendixen ContemPorary Art, Tom Chris- tiatives such as artist-run sPaces like toffersen Gallery, Kirkhoff ContemPorary »Baghuset«, »Koncern«, »Max Mundus« Art, Mogadishni CPH, Helene Nyborg and »Globe« (the latter in collaboration ContemPorary, V1 Gallery, Christina with theoreticians). Later exhibition Wilson Gallery. Over the years, the scene sPaces aPPeared such as »Saga Base- has thus been in the Process of building ment« and »Nørre Farimagsgade 55«, uP an infrastructure to rePresent, com - the hybrid initiative »Körner’s Kontor« municate and Promote a large genera - (Körner’s Office) and sPaces closer to a tion of young artists that seek to engage gallery structure such as »CamPbell’s in the discourse on the international art Occasionally« and the »1% ArtsPace and scene. APart from the mentioned Private Magazine«. It wasn’t until Nicolai Wallner galleries with a Professional and account- (one of the CamPbell’s initiators) oPened able strategy towards the international his own gallery in 1994 that CoPenhagen market as well as discourse, art centres, and Denmark saw a gallery focusing on museum institutions, state funded suP - young contemPorary art with an interna - Port agencies, recidency Programmes, tional orientation and ambition. The local based curators and collectors, etc. artists’ self-governed initiatives and acti- are Part of this. Even if today much still vities, much coming out of and centered remains lacking on the museum- and around the Royal Danish Art Academy, institutional level, the curatorial and still exist as an imPortant Part of the artistic activity in CoPenhagen is as high scene and have showed both quality as ever, the Public funding, Promotion, and continuity in their work and Projects. and residency agency Danish Arts Hence they Produce frameworks for Council (based on the Previous and Presentations and discussions, but have imPortant DCA Foundation) has found had no real institutional counterPart. With its shaPe. The increasing Professional - this in mind and with no disresPect for ism on all levels is contributing to the the imPortance and quality of the men - establishment of a real local art scene - tioned initiatives, an art scene needs an art scene that might attract a broader high level institutions and a committed sPectrum of international Players in the commercial gallery scene. From the near future. mid-nineties the scene develoPed with Professional galleries such as Nils Stærk Exportable Goods Presents a variety of ContemPorary Art, Tommy Lund Gallery artists and different Practises, as an art and the temPorarily existing Søren scene always is a Product of multiPle Houmann Gallery. In recent years the initiatives inside or outside of the institu - local scene in CoPenhagen (which still tional framework of art and exhibition rePresents Denmark at large) has seen a Production. Yet the exhibition does not 6 strive to be rePresentative of all the var - Practises, be it formal strategies in Paint - ious tendencies that have surfaced over ing and sculPture or social engaged and this Period. The broader view of Danish Political art. The underlying reference to artists active in these years can only Modernism is highly noticeable in the serve as a contextual backdroP for a art of the nineties as well as the Present more narrow selection with the goal of day artistic Production. Modernism has offering a Possible reading of a comPlex not only influenced the artists’ Practise, artistic reality. The exhibition is thus not but also more broadly rePresented a thematic, but intends to show several framework of references through which strategies arranged around the individu- the artists reflect their own work, whether al artworks and artistic attitudes. In an insisting on a continuation of Modernist attemPt to structure a relatively large num - agendas or distancing themselves from ber of artworks by twenty-three artists them. Today’s Danish artists shown in within a defined gallery sPace, the Pre- this exhibition rePresent different artistic sentation largely centers around four strategies regardless of the media they loosely organized Parallel fields of inter - work in. They diverge in both media and est: one section showing concePtually discourse, and whether it is Painting, working artists with a minimal, some - PhotograPhy, video, sculPture, installa - times even industrial, aesthetics; another tion or interventions, the works have wide Presenting artists involved in narrative ramifications over and beyond the formal structures and the discourse of rePre - considerations and investigations on the sentation; a third section grouPs artists one hand, and social and contextual / Pursuing more formal considerations of relational investigations on the other. Their Painting, drawing and sculPture; and the works address the fields of architecture, fourth focuses on artists engaged in PoPular and mass culture, Political and social Processes and societal issues. societal statements, Public sPace inter - These divisions and definitions