SALON POPULAIRE (KUNSTSAELE BERLIN)
Opening Wednesday 09.02. 18:00-21:00
daily 11:00-20:00
A very widespread but underappreciated form of exhibiting pictures is their presentation by human hands. This literal carrying of pictures by bodies often takes place in situations where, at the same time, pictures are produced of this very thing. The resulting multiple framings of the pictures create complex double exposures, which have long been a popular formula of image journalism. In acts of performance and demonstration based on ideological conviction or individual mourning, the usage of visual objects with different physical properties is both a corporal and an identifying practice. It is the site of an often nearly animistic exchange between the authority of the images held and the authenticity and ‘vitality’ of the carrier. Carrying Pictures brings together excerpts from press photographs, fragments from a treatise on visual theory, and scenes from the feature film Under Fire (Roger Spottiswoode, USA 1983) into a paradidactic demonstration of the practices and practical knowledge in the visual spaces of the political. The unavoidably staged quality of such observations of a second or third order is emphasized by the original soundtrack by Robert and Roland Lippok (To Rococo Rot, Tarwater), which dramatizes the text-image-event without illustrating it.
single channel video installation, 11 minutes
Tom Holert is an art historian and cultural studies scholar as well as an artist. He lives and works in Berlin and Vienna, where he teaches at the Academy of Fine Arts. His most recent publications include: Regieren im Bildraum (Polypen/b_books, 2008) and Das Erziehungsbild: Zur visuellen Kultur des Pädagogischen (with Marion von Osten, Schlebrügge.Editor, 2010). His artistic works extend and intertwine with his theoretical and historical works on visual culture.
Concept and realisation: Tom Holert
Produced by 8th Gwangju Biennale 2010 at the invitation of Massimiliano Gioni.
Editor: Adi Wolotzky
Audio: Robert and Ronald Lippok
Translation: Gerrit Jackson
Consulting: Claudia Honecker
