WHAT’S ON AT FRIISLAND?

PREVIOUS EVENTS

MARCUS COATES

THE DIRECTORS


PREVIOUSLY AT FRIISLAND

TALLBLONDLADIES (DE/SE): THE NEXT DECADE BEGINS

From January 13th to February 19th 2024 TallBlondLadies (DE/SE) exhibited THE NEXT DECADE BEGINS. 

Since 2003, Anna Berndtson (SE) and Irina Runge (DE) have been exploring their own and the public’s boundaries with their duo TBL (TallBlondLadies). TBL works with Long Duration Live Performance Art, which is a form of endurance art lasting for several hours or days.

In this anniversary project, their latest performance, Long Legged, is a like a deep dive into 20 years of artistic research. An image and sound installation as well as materials including costume parts from the performance will make TBL present through out the exhibition.

TBL’s long duration performances live from the intertwining of aesthetic form, feminine exposure and a political-social charge. Shoes – as a substantial component of every TBL performance – act as a research instrument, as a symbol-carrier and sound body, through which paradoxes arise. With their (a-)synchronised movements performed over hours, they achieve an intensity that provokes and moves. They create still lifes that reverberate in the minds of the public for a long time, just like the sound of their shoes.

www.tallblondladies.com

January 2024, FRIISLAND LIVE with

TALLBLONDLADIES (DE/SE) AND SOPHIE DUPONT (DK) WITH OTTAVIA CATENACCI (IT)

On September 8th 2023 FRIISLAND LIVE presented a NEW YEAR CELEBRATION with the following program:

3 hours of durational performance with TallBlondLadies (DE/SE) called LONG LEGGED- A welcome and introduction by Ellen and Henrik, served with bubbles and amazing tacos by chef Julián Rodriguez. Later Sophie Dupont (DK) with Ottavia Catenacci (IT) performed BREATHING IN VIOLENT TIMES – How Do You Feel? And the afternoon was finished with a great artists talk.

September 2023, FRIISLAND LIVE with

MARIA LEPISTÖ AND JOHANNES DEIMLING

On September 8th 2023 FRIISLAND LIVE presented MARIA LEPISTÖ (S) and JOHANNES DEIMLING (DE) 

MARIA LEPISTÖ (S) performed with a choose-your-own adventure / performance lecture about humans, wolves and other animals. The performance was an extension of her wondrous exhibition “The Animals Were Never Alone III” with a vernissage August 23rd 2023.

and

JOHANNES DEIMLING (DE) performed at the ocean a few metres away from FRIISLAND – with a new performance from his series “The Dance of the Receptors”. He was also a part of the ÅBEN festival, you can also experience him 9/9 with another work in the German Embassy (https://kopenhagen.diplo.de/dk-de)

Maria Lepistö is a Swedish performance artist in Denmark working with sound and oral storytelling, mixing science, history, mythology and personal anecdotes. A recurring topic is animal communication; a research that explores otherness identity and embodiment. Working with her own voice and the voices of others, she wants to stretch what language can be and how it manifests inside and between us, in sound, movement, and imitation. Read more at www.marialepisto.dk

Johannes Deimling, born 1969 in Andernach on the Rhine, is a visual artist and performance art teacher, who works in the fields of performance art, video art, drawing and art film. Central to Deimling’s work is the creation of visual, poetic imagery that intentionally eludes direct logic while offering a metaphorical perception. Read more at www.bbbjohannesdeimling.de

FRIISLAND LIVE was part of the ÅBEN festival 2023 .

MARIA LEPISTÖ: THE ANIMALS WERE NEVER ALONE III

From August 23rd to september 29th. The Animals Were Never Alone III was Maria Lepistö’s first solo exhibition. It revolved around her ongoing research with The Animal Sound Archive, a scientific archive of animal voice recordings, and her own desire to be part of a community of people who howl like wolves.
Using text, speaking sculptures and props, we invite you into a fictional world where the archive takes the role of a Surveillance facility, examining loneliness as a collective human state of mind.
At both the opening and at the finisage there was a howling workshop: This workshop was for everybody who wanted to experiment with their voice, trained or not.
The howling workshop began with listening to recordings of wolves and analyzing them together with singer Helle Thun. There was a warm up of voices and practiceing singing skills that aied to help each participant to find their unique way of howling and how to use it in a group to communicate.
The next step was to become a wolf in group hypnosis, guided by Maria and inspired by the concept of shifting, a mental shift practiced by Therians, people who identify as wolves.

About Maria:
Maria Lepistö is a Swedish performance artist in Denmark working with sound and oral storytelling, mixing science, history, mythology and personal anecdotes. A recurring topic is animal communication; a research that explores otherness identity and embodiment. Working with her own voice and the voices of others, she wants to stretch what language can be and how it manifests inside and between us, in sound, movement, and imitation. Read more at www.marialepisto.dk

About Helle Thun:
Classical soprano & vocal artist, music director, singing teacher and choir leader · Specializing in ‘Kulning’ an ancient singing techniques from Scandinavia, traditional calls used to call down sheep, goats and cows from high mountain pastures where they have been grazing during the day, see https://nordicvoice.dk/about-kulning/

Supported by Statens Kunstfond and Københavns Kommune

June 2023, FRIISLAND LIVE with

JOHN HUNTINGTON (SE): THE DARK ADMINISTRATOR and black metal artbar

The Dark Administrator was a performance lecture and exhibition about bureaucracy and resistance. With the public office as its starting point, the work deals with modern people’s urge to systematize everything.

The performance was a documentary collage of stories and examples of everyday frustrations that gradually transform into powerlessness. Various ritual protective measures are presented and an alternate professional figure slowly emerges from the shadows. The work is accompanied by apocalyptic sounds by the Swedish musician Dödsvarg. The exhibition displayed various remains from ceremonial bureaucratic actions.

On Saturday June 3rd 2023 Black’Grove band ILLA and Claus Haxholm’s Black Metal project Grev Trold played live

About the artist:
John Huntington is a Swedish artist working in a conceptual tradition, expressed through performative, sculptural, textual and immersive art projects. Educated at Konstfack in Stockholm and at the Art Academy in Umeå.

The Dark Administrator was Part of CPH STAGE and ART WEEK and supported by Statens Kunstfond.

April 2023, FRIISLAND LIVE with

CHRISTOPHER KLINE (US/DE) – EARLY LABYRINTH and BANANSKOLEN

In April and Maj 2023 we were presenting Christopher Klines EARLY LABYRINTH. The exhibition opened with at live event April 22nd 2023 where both Christopher and BANANSKOLEN performed.

EARLY LABYRINTH is a clandestine entity formed in Berlin at the pandemic dawn. A multi-headed community, the scalable troupe will be sending its Info-Ministry representative to Friisland to head up its next operation: the production of a series of recruitment videos, Agitprop and forced confessions in anticipation of its upcoming album and communiqué “DO YOU WANT TO BE PART OF THE CRIME OR PART OF THE PUNISHMENT?”

EARLY LABYRINTH is a clandestine entity formed in Berlin at the pandemic dawn. A multi-headed community, the scalable troupe will be sending its Info-Ministry representative to Friisland to head up its next operation: the production of a series of recruitment videos, Agitprop and forced confessions in anticipation of its upcoming album and communiqué “DO YOU WANT TO BE PART OF THE CRIME OR PART OF THE PUNISHMENT?”

EARLY LABYRINTH is “thematically punk” yet sonically channels far funkier spirits to guide it through the ancient maze of human song craft. Soulful hooks of class war, smooth harmonies meditating on military torture, and choral refrains to stave off end times become tools for carving out space beyond the omnipresent police state.

http://earlylabyrinth.com/

Christopher Kline is a syncretic artist who prefers to be called maker and whose projects range over a wide variety of artistic fields and media. In collective and solo projects he has dealt with research in the field of ritual music, sacred culture, and primitivism focusing on their abstraction and re-contextualization in happenings and exhibitions.Fabrics, costumes, tapestries, masks and quilts represent the main part of his handcraft-based artworks production. Often created in collaboration with Sol Calero, with whom he also has the berlin-based project space Kinderhook & Caracas. 

Supported by Statens Kunstfond.

MARCH 2022, FRIISLAND LIVE with:

ESTHER FERRER (ES/FR) AND BORIS NIESLONY (DE)

In March 2023 we had the great pleasure to to present two legendary European performance artists in Copenhagen; Esther Ferrer and Boris Nieslony

On March 2nd at School of Conceptual and Contextual Practices, the Royal Art Academy we had a lecture by Boris Nieslony about “The Performance Art Archive” and Ellen Friis and Henrik Vestergaard talked about “Documentation as a performative strategy”

On March 3rd both at Friisland Esther Ferrer persented a Lecture and Performance and Boris Nieslony presented a performance. Both extraordinary!

Esther Ferrer (1937): Performance has been her principal form of artistic expression since 1965, both as a soloist and as a member of the group ZAJ, until its dissolution in 1996. In 1999 she was one of the two artists representing Spain in the Venice Biennale, in 2008 she recived le Spanish National prize for the Arts and in 2012 the Gure Artea Prize of Basque Government in 2013 MAV Prize (Mujeres en las Artes Visuales) and in 2014 the Price Marie Claire et the Velazquez Prize ( International prize in Spain).

Boris Nieslony (1945): Cofounder (1985) of the international performance Art group Black Market International, and of the Art Service Association (ASA) for performers and theorists (1986). In 1993, the 100-day project “Quantenpool Köln” was launched at documenta 9. In 1995 the first performance art conference was held in Cologne and at the same time the Performance Art Archive was transferred from collecting activities to generating knowledge. The founding of the E.P.I. center generated further networking between artists, organizations, and projects in performance art.

November 2022: FRIISLAND LIVE with

HESSELHOLDT & MEJLVANG (DK) – TWO FOOLS IN A SINKING BOAT

Two Fools in a Sinking Boat was a performance in Virtual Reality that could be experienced at the Friisland from November 11th to December 16th 2022. Guests could wear VR goggles and experience the two fools up close – in an alternative reality –

In Two Fools in a Sinking Boat, two fools circle in rhymes and stanzas about the state of the earth on the brink of disaster. About the sea and the sun, which the climate crisis has turned into threats. They yearn for the past and look forward with trepidation and optimism. They call for battle and for truce, for community and action. They ramble and contradict themselves non-stop. They laugh, sing and joke, but behind the funny mask lurks melancholy, despair and fear.

Hesselholdt & Mejlvang are an artist duo that have collaborated since 1999 around large and site-specific installations that explore collective identities and national affiliations. The works often involve performativity and explorations of public space.

www.hesselholdt-mejlvang.dk

Photos, VR recording and editing: David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo

SVEND SØMOD (DK): 8 HZ – BRAINWAVE MANIPULATION

September-December 2022: Svend Sømods “8 Hz: Brainwave Manipulation” simulates the state of the brain during deep meditation with a series of flashes at the frequency of 8 Hz. Wearing VR goggles, guests were able to achieve instant meditation!

Throughout his practice, Svend Sømod investigates the interaction between senses, the universal validity of mathematics and the reality of the brain. Has experimented with cocktail printers, music, light installations, furniture making, VR and more.

30th September 2022, FRIISLAND LIVE:

SVEND SØMOD, MARIE THAMS & DANI PLOEGER (NL/DE)

In this FRIISLAND LIVE we focused on the human body in a high tech world… SVEND SØMOD (DK) presented his new VR work “8 Hz” and he had also brought special cocktails.

Then MARIE THAMS (DK) performed her work “aaarena”. The work deals with questions around the body as an arena and tool in the accelerated and norm-setting working life (see video).

And DANI PLOEGER (NL/DE) presented his practice, which explores situations of conflict and crisis on the fringes of the world of high-tech consumerism. His work is informed by field research on the use of everyday technologies under extraordinary circumstances (see video).

Supported by Statens Kunstfond. Dani Ploeger is invited by Burmester & Wium.

SEPT 9th 2022, FRIISLAND LIVE:

JELILI ATIKU, FLORIAN FEIGL, ULLA HVEJSEL

FRIISLAND LIVE – a blast of a night!

Three amazing international performance artists performed live on the 9th of September 2022. Jelili Atiku presented his practice concerned with climate and human rights (see video). Florian Feigl performed a work from his 300 series (300 performances of each 300 seconds) (see video), and Ulla Hvejsel shared her newest insights in a “trickle down” economy, where shit is the new gold (see video).

Jelili Atiku is a Nigerian multimedia artist with political concerns for human rights His artistic work deals with the psychosocial and emotional effects of traumatic events such as war, violence, poverty, corruption, climate change.
https://jeliliatiku.webs.com/

Florian Feigl is based in Berlin. He works internationally. His practice investigates performance art as an art form, its themes, times and spaces, as well as referring to numerous other artists.
https://www.florianfeigl.com/

Ulla Hvejsel is from Copenhagen. Her humorous practice is concerned with society and politics which she elegantly satirizes in talks and performances together with her audience.
https://realpolitik.dk

DAVID SEBASTIAN LOPEZ RESTREPO – THE FINISH LINE.

David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo is a Colombian performance artist based in Copenhagen. His work is based on the interaction between the audience and the artist in the construction of the performance as a shared experience. Everyday life actions such as making food or cycling make part of his artistic practice.From August 12th to 27th 2022 David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo (COL) presented the exhibition and performance: “The Finish Line – Wolt Migrant”
The Finish Line was the ending of a durational performance, the “Wolt migrant project”. Here Sebastian got a job through smartphone apps to deliver food in the city of Copenhagen. He pedaled 9400 kilometers, which the linear distance between Denmark and his home country Colombia. The Finish Line – Wolt Migrant” is both a metaphorical and political project. It navigates between the nostalgia of going back home or integrate himself to a new society and making a critic or a commentary about low-income jobs and precarious conditions of work in migrant or artistic environments.

June 2022, FRIISLAND LIVE:

TAIWO AIYEDOGBON, MARGARET DRAGU, MADELEINE ANDERSSON

Margaret Dragu (CA) celebrated her 50th year of performative practice with “The New Akademy of Life and Performance Aktions” – an interactive performance landscape together with B&W Art and Support (see video). Madeleine Andersson (SE/DK) presented her project “Petrosexuality”; an investigation into how current systems of fossil fuel combustion is upheld and validated by western culture and its heterosexual socialisation. Taiwo Aiyedogbon (NG) presented “Asiweju” – a yoruba ritual for powerful leaders, which is reinterpreted to address women in a modern society. 

TAIWO AIYEDOGBON – GÈLÈDÈ 

Taiwo Aiyedogbon (Nigeria)the department of Fine Art (Sculpture).Yaba College of Technology, Lagos, Nigeria in 2017. Her work for Friisland was  “Gèlèdè”; a site-specific VR performance telling a story of a popular Yoruba ceremonial masquerade. 

MIAO JIAXIN – 725 PERFORMANCE

Miao Jiaxin was born in Shanghai and emigrated to New York City. Miao’s works often express the ambivalent and sometimes antagonistic tension that always exists between the individual and governing or cultural authorities, questioning assumptions about power in relation to identity politics. In Friisland he presented his “725 PERFORMANCE” i VR (see video).

Friisland live:

Miao Jiaxin (US), Kristoffer Ørum (DK), and David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo (CO/DK).

March 12th 2022: Live event with works by Miao Jiaxin (US), Kristoffer Ørum (DK), and David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo (CO/DK).

The 4th performance night with live works and a dialogue with the audience. The evening also marked the opening of the new exhibition with an installation and a VR performance by Miao Jiaxin until May 6th. The programme was: Miao Jiaxin (US): A German Aufguss Sauna Ritual performed by a Chinese from the US. Kristoffer Ørum (DK) A Human Pretending To Be An Artist Pretending To Be A Crayfish. David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo (CO/DK): Halfway from Denmark to Colombia on a metaphorical bike journey.

Friisland live:

Friisland Yuleparty (December 3rd)

On 3rd of December 2021 we held our Yuleparty. The program was a finissage of the exhibition Performance/Textiles and contained live talks and performances by the artists Francis Patrick Brady (IR/CA/UK/SE) and Sif Hedegaard (DK), as well as “B” – a VR-opera- installation by Essi Kausalainen (FI)

We also presented our artist in residence, Adam James (UK/SE) who is working with augmented reality and live action role play. And xmas treats from the artists´ respective countries were served.

Performance/Textile (November 4th-December 3rd 2021)

For Friisland’s second exhibition we have selected three artists who work with textiles and performance. The exhibition is a collection of three projects that combine fabrics and performance.

Essi Kausalainen is one of Finlands most exciting performance artists. She often investigates the exchange of energies between beings. Essi has created a site-specific opera performance for VR. The opera is called “B”  and is performed by soprano Katinka Frida Bohse Meyer (DK), performance artist Laura Cemin (ITA) and actor/singer Yuko Takeda (JPN).

Francis Patrick Brady’s work “The Ignorant Gamesmaster” was created during a recidency at Copenhagen Contemporary and Friisland in October 2021. The gamesmaster is like Jacques Rancières “Schoolmaster” in an all-knowing position. But what happens with the game if he or she doesn’t know the rules? The game is played on a textile board created for this work. Also, the textiles that the gamesmaster is wearing is an essential component of this work (or non-game).

Sif Hedegaard is a Danish artist from Det Fynske Kunstakademi. She performed at Friisland on October 15th with the work “Out of Body Garment”. Here she wore modified clothing objects. The objects from the performance were left as an exhibit and altered and manipulated at her final performance work at finissage, December 3rd 2021.

Performanceopera “B” by Essi Kausalainen (FI) was supported by FRAME, Findland & Gusaf Packelens mindefond

Friisland live: Anti-Culturenight! (October 15th 2021).

with works by Essi Kausalainen (F), Sif Hedegård (DK) og Francis Patrick Brady (UK/SE)

The Anti-kulturnat was the 2nd performance night at Friisland, and also marked the opening of the new exhibition with an installation and a VR performance by Essi Kausalainen. We had pies and wine, and enjoyed an evening with the following program:

Sif Hedegård (DK) performed with “Out Of Body Garment” with modified clothing objects.
Francis Patrick Brady (UK) performed with the DOHL game – a worldbuilding and discussion based card game. The DOHL cards are a roleplaying tool that will give the guests a new job and profession in a fictional future society.
Essi Kausalainen (FI) presented a performanceopera for 3 voices called “B”. The performance was commissioned by Friisland as an installation with VR performance. This was a live version which also included a 4th voice performed by a child.
Local soprano: Katinka Frida Bohse Meyer (DK)
Performance Artist: Laura Cemin (ITA)
Actor/Singer: Yuko Takeda (JPN)
Child: Ava Leth (DK)

Performanceopera “B” by Essi Kausalainen (FI) was supported by FRAME, Findland & Gusaf Packelens mindefond

THE IGNORANT GAMESMASTER: Live game/ performance by Francis Patrick Brady (October 1st 2021)

“But now the gamesmaster opens his mouth to explain the game. He makes a series of reasonings in order to explain the series of reasonings that constitute the game. But why should the game need such help?

The Ignorant Gamesmaster is a new performance game created by Francis Patrick Brady, who explores crossovers between art, games and performance. He is educated at Kunsthögskolan i Malmö i 2007 and was in a residency at Friisland in collaboration with Copenhagen Contemporary.

The performance could be experienced during the Copenhagen Art Week, October 1st-3rd 2021.

50 Farlige ting alle børn bør prøve (50 Dangerous Things). The anniversary (10th October 2021)

October 10th 2021, we were celebrating the 5th anniversary of the performance “50 Farlige ting, alle børn bør prøve (50 Dangerous Things). We have been touring all over Denmark and this was the 152nd performance. It is a remarkable success, and we celebrated this by presenting a version at Friisland with free entrance.

The performance is based on the book 50 Dangerous Things by Julie Spiegler og Gever Tulley, and it was originally created by Forschungstheater/ Fundustheater in Hamburg. Live Art Danmark has the Danish rights and performers Henrik Vestergaard og Daniel Norback have adapted and reinterpreted the performance in collaboration with Ellen Friis.

Otmar Wagners VR performance “TOYS OF JOYLESSNESS or DISTURBANCE & DEBILITY” (September 10th – October 3rd 2021)

Sience the 90es, Vienna based artist Otmar Wagner has investigated Europe as a construct; a political, cultural, and physical body. A place divided by walls, penetrated by circuits and political diseases. Wagner sets up a room as a living body where energies flow, and similar to a physical body, the materials are animated and transformed in circulatory systems.

Friisland was transformed into an installation for 3 weeks, where visitors could wear VR headsets and experience Wagners performing within the installation. One guest at a time.

Otmar Wagner: The cut-off frequency of thinking – about my work (august 23rd 2021).

CURRICULUM, the public school of performance art held its 7th lecture with a living archive of the performance art history – followed by drinks and hanging-out. The lecture presented the spectrum of Otmar Wagner’s artistic works ranging from essay performances and concert performances to performative installations and radio plays. In his lecture, he provided insights into his performative work and the artistic strategies that underlie it. Wagner took the audience on a ‘delirious association trip’, as he does in many of his performances.

Otmar Wagner is a Vienna-based performance artist working between fine arts and performing arts. He is educated from Applied Theatre Studies in Giessen and Objekttheater in Amsterdam. He teaches Performance Theory at the University of Arts in Graz, Austria.

CURRICULUM is the public school of performance art: a lecture program curated by Cecilie Ullerup Schmidt in collaboration with Theatre- and Performance Studies. CURRICULUM is supported by Bikubenfonden, the Danish Arts Council and the Austrian Embassy.

Friisland Opening (August 21st 2021. A performance night with Otmar Wagner, David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo and Goodiepal

Friisland Opening was the 1st performance night at Friisland. It marked the opening of Friisland and the the first exhibition with a installation and VR performance by Otmar Wagner. We enjoyed an evening with flammkuchen, nice cider from our neighbors – and the following program:

Otmar Wagner (AT) presented “TOYS OF JOYLESSNESS or DISTURBANCE & DEBILITY. The performance was comisioned by Friisland as the VR-performance installation. This was a live and extended version.
David Sebastian Lopez Restrepo (CO) presented the performance “HOT TUB”. A participatory performance where a hot tub was the centre of discussions about art, philosophy and politics.
Goodiepal (DK) presented a manifest for intergenerational art.