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BLICK 2004: NEW FILMS AND VIDEOS FROM THE NORDIC AND BALTIC REGION
Screened in Kunstverein München 5, 11 - 12 and 18 - 19 December 2004
The third edition of Blick expands beyond the Nordic focus of Blick 1999 and Blick 2001 to include new film and video works from the Baltic region. Out of the 564 films and videos that were submitted, the curators have put together a five-hour programme consisting of 43 works. The material is diverse and demonstrates a plethora of approaches: documentary strategies and enactments, alongside abstractions and animations. Animation features particularly strongly in this year's selection. Other characteristics are a delight in telling stories with a focus on imagery. The programme has six main focal points - or loosely formulated themes - which emerge in the flow of long and short contributions: FAITH, PORTRAITS, FAMILY TIES, METAMORPHOSIS, TAKING THE MATTER INTO ONE'S OWN HANDS and LIFESTYLES.
FAITH is about having faith in something and about defining one's non-beliefs. This includes both supernatural phenomena and speaking in tongues, electrosensitivity and magic. Sharing one's beliefs with others creates togetherness - but also 'outsidership', where ideals, threats, and myths play an important part.
Another strong trend in contemporary film and video art is PORTRAITS - featuring encounters with, or memories of, people. Here we meet Finnish teenagers discussing transsexuality, the Latvian girl band Crazy Girls, Zdenko Buzek who is an artist in Zagreb, and Magdalena who organises a guided tour of her home in Stockholm.
Another kind of moving image portrait features in the section on FAMILY TIES. The family is shown here simultaneously as a symbol of security and alienation. Harrowing stories of domestic violence and adoption are visualised using, among other things, animation and dramatisation of rediscovered family documents.
The works gathered under the collective heading of METAMORPHOSIS deal with apparently everyday phenomena and thoughts, conveying the fuzzy zone between what we see and what we feel, often with subtle means and a sense of humour, and standing our habitual patterns on their head.
The films in TAKING THE MATTER INTO ONE'S OWN HANDS and LIFESTYLES are keen and humorous portrayals of our time. The first category is dominated by activism, from Danish immigration policy to the organisation that fights for food and against bombs on the US west coast. As the title suggests, the second category is about surviving in contemporary society, and the art of creating one's own lifestyle within the social body. Dividing the different sections are a handful of 'interludes' - short videos that stand out independently.
The programme will go on tour in 2005, under the auspices of Riksutställningar - Swedish Touring Exhibitions.
The works were selected by:
Maria Lind Kunstverein München
Anna Livion-Ingvarsson, Riksutställningar - Swedish Touring Exhibitions
Cecilia Widenheim, Moderna Museet, Stockholm
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