Fake I.D.
Jemima Brown
Morten Viskum
Michelle Deignan
Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven
Risk Hazekamp
Simon Willems
Angie Reed
Deborah Schamoni
Caron Geary
Curated by Ken Pratt
The actualization of an authenticity is an idea that remains bound up in popular notions of the aims of artistic practice. Perpetuated by the osmosis of art historical ideas into the popular consciousness, mass understandings of art often embrace the idea that the artist seeks to present an authentic experience. This is particularly notable in popular notions about figurative and representational art: the artist strives to offer the viewer an authentic insight into the full identity of a portrait sitter or to render a building or vista in a way that offers a true sense of the experience, one that cuts to its essence. If anything, this notion of the artist as someone who can offer us the ‘real’ experience of something in all its beauty or power may even have been heightened in the evolutionary developments to overcome reactionary expectations of representation or realism in the period after photography and movements such as Modernism. Perhaps nothing highlights this preoccupation with the relationship between artistic practices and ‘the authentic’ more than the developments of discourses such as Bourriaud’s notions of Relational Aesthetics in the late 1990’s. Within them there is an intrinsic assumption that artistic practices that seek to engage ‘authentically’ with social contexts constitute a valid and, perhaps, more desirable position for contemporary artists. In many instances, these notions of art that has an authentic engagement with the social context has shied away from artistic practices that results in objects; steer clear of things looking anything like the traditional idea of the painting or sculpture. And yet, both currently, and contemporaneous to the developments of the kinds of practices offered up in a Relational Aesthetics and its adjunct and subsequent developments, there are numerous contemporary artists who, through very different means and to very different ends, intrinsically build in evident artifice and ‘inauthenticity’ to their work. Identifiable fakeness, artifice or even blatant lies appear as content, concept or working methodologies. Sometimes as counterpoint in which questions about the formal orthodoxies of art are challenged, sometimes as juxtaposition playing a game of double-bluff with popular notions of art as a purveyor of an ‘authentic’ human experience, diverse artists adopt strategies in which visual elements of the discernibly false and inauthentic feed discussions about everything from the nature of personal identity and cultural trends to media constructs of the documentary. Fake I.D. is a group show that traces some of these devices and strategies through the work of a handful of international artists producing work today.
Jemima Brown
JEMIMA BROWN spent years collaborating with her invented twin sister Dolly, both the feature and co-author of numerous works. And not to mention a frequent face in many of Brown’s works. Dolly, an avatar of sorts, often appears as a reasonably direct replication of Brown’s own appearance in some works whereas as much of the other works – sculpture, video and drawings – have progressed into a home-brew process that sees Brown casting faces and body parts from a range of individuals, often family members. From these, the representational potential of the casts are reworked into non-existent beings. They are not entirely figurative of representational, the deconstructionist language of her sculpture being deployed, instead, to develop a sense of an identity, sometimes fantastic, sometimes closer to social observation. Recent bodies of work have seen Brown developing discourses that relate to the world of arty scenes and cliques she observes around her East End studio and home. These are often developed in such a way that the rather bemused social observation develops a context; a historical position in relation to other real or literary art and underground scenes, cliques or circles. Some of these shorthand ciphers for characters or typologies embedded in her sculpture and video works, are drawn from the art world. So, there develops a layer of reflection and critique of the art world’s structures and presentation of itself to the arriving audience. In other works, particularly those that use the readily understood imagery of Dolly, Brown’s invented genetically identical twin, we find the insertion of an alter ego – that one tiny but important step removed from the identity of the artist herself- inserted into video scenarios that have a cinematic quality to them. They are rarely conclusively narrative; mise-en-scène a script short of a plot line. Into their ambiguous moods we can try to insert our own narratives or emotional projections, never entirely sure if it is the real artist to whom they apply. (Courtesy The Agency, London)
Caron Geary
The London born ‘n bred artist CARON GEARY works primarily in photography and video. Though she also has an established parallel career in music. The relevance to this is that her performative construct – Feral- frequently crosses between these two worlds of visual art and performance. Feral always grabs attention. Aggressive, raucous, flirtatious and, frankly, scary, Feral appears to be capable of things that most of us are not. Geary appears to have created Feral as a means of being able to place herself in interrogative positions that might not be possible outside of the special status of the fantastic character; the exempted psychology behind the mask with all of its associations with a magical, special status. Feral can ask questions the climates of political correctness disallow. Feral can explore identities that go against the received notions of gender, race, age and possibly even species. Interestingly enough, whilst Feral has a long history in Geary’s live art rock music performances, her visual art has largely involved her pointing her camera at others. In a recent body of work, however, we find her aiming her lens in the direction of her own mythical invention. In one series referring loosely to eighteenth century portraits of slaves in ethnographic collections, Geary adopts a kind of alienated position from her day-to-day identity, approaching her own invention with the surprise, fear and intrinsic notions of ‘the other’ that we associate with colonialism. It is as if she is pondering the way in which we are socially taught to tame and subjugate aspects from within ourselves that do not fit with who we think we should be. Feral has an in-your-face artificiality about her on first take. And yet, as we progress into Geary’s practice we see that she postulates –possibly even worries – that beneath the surface of everyday appearances, Feral is an all too real entity.
Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven
The eminent Belgian artist ANNE-MIE VAN KERCKHOVEN has a long artistic history that has, in various ways, seen her proffer imagery that seems to be representing women, and often herself, in a way that is frequently enigmatic, often provocative. Van Kerckhoven’s prolific output that has taken in almost every medium; from painting and drawing to video and performance. It is simply too sprawling and complex to distil into a handful of convenient trends or themes. Modern thought, critical theory and a contemporary analysis of preceding philosophies are all as much present in the content of her earlier works as is the in-your-face brand of Feminism that we associate with Punk and its side movements. In various places, perhaps most evidently of all, the Head Nurse body of work, Van Kerckhoven often proffers a performative image of herself (or women by implication) that never entirely signifies the ciphers of an assumed identity but has the hallmarlks of something that we intrinsically understand as standing for something other than her default setting; the Van Kerckhoven whom we might meet at a party or in a corner café. Head Nurse, with all of the fetishistic and sadomasochistic connotations that both the words and some of the imagery imply, is in fact, just one of the identities that AMVK (another) has developed for herself. There is something that we immediately sense from her imagery that her own physical appearance in various works is not meant as portraiture in the most literal sense, something consciously staged though never fully theatrical. Van Kerckhoven frequently seems to offer images of herself and women that denote a sense of dislocation; a sense of not identifying with or conforming to what she readily understands women (or simply people) are supposed to be in the society in which she has found herself. This is less the Feminism of a self-righteous rage and more one of a thinking (perhaps too much!) resistance to it all. Van Kerckhoven offers us snapshots of who might live on the inside that we see less easily than the daily exterior. Yet notions such as ‘fake’ or ‘inauthentic’ are also problematic in their most simple sense. Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven rather views these personas or assumed psychological positions as other identities. In her own explanation, we get a sense of the instrumental function they serve in her artistic practice, “Head Nurse is another ID I gave myself to work on my extensive Sex & Technology Project. I needed this construction to be able to concentrate myself. The HeadNurse being the assistant of Doctor Nietzsche. It is an identity I live in, similar to the multiple personalities that Pessoa took on.” (Courtesy Zeno X, Antwerp)
Morten Viskum
The Norwegian artist MORTEN VISKUM produces predominantly what might be called conceptual sculpture of various forms. One such body of work involves developing a new work each year taken from a cutting edge-technology that enables him to have an extremely accurate cast of his own body made. On his birthday. These are then developed into sculptural installation projects –with Viskum’s own likeness at the centre- in which he is inevitably cast as someone he is not to all intents and purposes; messianic; a religious devotee or a muscle-bound bodybuilder. If the games that these works play with artifice and identity are very direct, then others involve more complex chicanery. One such body of works are paintings. Or more accurately, what appear to be paintings. Painted in different palettes, sometimes bright and multicoloured and sometimes less so, we appear to be approaching abstract paintings, paintings in which the direction of most of the brushstrokes are fairly straight and regular. It is only when we become aware that these works are, in fact, painted with a dead human hand, the direction and possibilities of the paint defined by the limitations of human fingers set in rigor mortis, that we realise that we are dealing with something altogether different. These are, in effect, not paintings at all, but conceptual objects passing as paintings, their discourse as much to do with their construction – actually clearly visible in the nature of the marks on the canvas once we recognise their provenance- as with the remaining object. This simultaneity of a (false) first impression and an underlying discourse coldly at odds with the initially unchallenging appearance is a reoccurring mechanism in Viskum’s work, just as recognisable in earlier works in which what promises to be a familiar jar of olives turns out to be something altogether different. Naturally, Viskum’s work appears to be making certain commentaries on consumerism and values (of life itself) in contemporary society. But there is of course a strong art historical sense linking it to the tradition of the Vanitas; the subtle reminders of metaphysical matters hidden amongst the seemingly familiar. And, given the Vanitas’ frequent fusion of scientific and philosophical or religious imagery, it is perhaps a form that might naturally appeal to Viskum, a former veterinary surgeon. In one sense then, Viskum frequently explores new ways in which to present us with a (false) impression that later reveals itself to be discussing the relative moral questions raised as much by the state of science as social psychologies.
Simon Willems
SIMON WILLEMS is a British painter whose practice is eclectic and difficult to pin down to a single preoccupation or thematic. We do, however, get the feeling that discussions about painting itself often play a role, quite clearly visible or simmering beneath the surface. He offers us almost hyperrealistic depictions of things or vignettes. Almost. At some point, many of the works that depict apparently recognisable things or objects appear to disintegrate, fold in on themselves and kick off a different discussion about abstraction and the nature of constructed images. Or, perhaps more perplexingly, we are offered ostensibly naturalistic renderings of things that in fact turn out to be unnatural, unreal or highly unlikely: characters from Star Wars, reanimated dinosaurs or statistically unlikely events. Willems often employs the use of images that viewers would find hard to read as straightforward renderings of real things. Yet, the are played with a straight face. Often these are presented in a style or vernacular that makes direct reference to art history. Non-existent science fiction androids are represented in scenes culled from historical genres or inserted into contexts that seem familiar from the communal visual archive. Detailed close-ups flirt with the audience expectations and platitudes tossed about regarding painting. For example, the accurately depicted eyes shown in close-up –the eyes commonly held to be the locus of some kind of inner truth and a test of the painter’s skill- turn out to be those of pigs instead of humans. And, given that pigs are somewhat similar to humans, especially if we are to believe what anthropologists report about distant cannibal tribes, perhaps the joke assumes a double-edged quality. Willems captures the eye of the pig wherein anything truthful resides with an accuracy that suggests that, with simple zoonosis, we can assume his talent would work on humans too. In effect, the games of artifice and blatant falseness in Willems’ work have nothing to do with any present or implied persona of the artist as such, but instead in the way in which we are offered, at apparent face value, a visible artifice that, in turn, prompts the direction towards the issues occupying his attention.
Risk Hazekamp
RISK HAZEKAMP is a Dutch artist who works primarily with photography and video. In her work, the language of cinema is directly engaged. In the earlier body of work that first brought her international attention, the cinematic language engaged was undeniably the language of Hollywood. But more recent series have seen a shift in sensibility towards a more European notion; Nouvelle Vague, French and German film. Works from earlier series took on the issue of gender by the horns, quite literally in some cases. The images of “the West”, cowboys and all the baggage that they carry in terms of gender and media constructions of gender, are prevalent. In the most recent works since her decision to move to Berlin, there is a notable shift. Could it be that the city’s long tradition with androgyny and gender skulduggery has seeped beneath her skin? No longer are we presented with the crisp clean framing of discussions of gender in terms growing out of a traditional American or Dutch feminist gender and sexuality perspective prevalent in artistic practice by the late 1980’s, itself an assimilation of earlier feminist theory on gender and sexuality. Instead, we are offered the heady scheissegal ambiguity and complexity associated with Berlin on a continuum. A similar awareness of the levels of ‘visible lies’ necessary to shatter old gender stereotypes, offer new ones and then, in turn to challenge these new orthodoxies, is inherent in an adjunct series of new works - the ‘Under the Influence’ series – where she effectively pays homage to some of the key artists addressing issues of gender and sexual identity over the last five decades. In these works, not only does Hazekamp offer an apparent ‘fakeness’ comparable with that of the original authors – for example a masculine identity in a biologically female body – but she must, in some cases, effectively stand in for the physical presence of the original author. Naturally, this is a sophisticated ruse rather than a crude one. It is not a pantomime in which we must accept Hazekamp’s own rather different body from that of, amongst others, Catherine Opie. Instead, the construction acts most like a grand gesture in which we trace the influence – or more accurately inspiration- of these earlier artists’ achievements within Hazekamp’s established oeuvre of her own. (Courtesy Cokkie Snoei)
Angie Reed
The practice of the Berlin-based Italian/American artist ANGIE REED has always involved drawing and an interest in animation, an influence of the American pop culture of her youth. She has explored many permutations of these various practices. One result is the performance-based works. The other main form is the use of her idiosyncratic drawings –or animations made from them- in making installations. In some cases these have involved turning specific rooms into a form of three-dimensional storyboard. In others, the work is more sculptural, drawing on Arte Povera ideas of using cheap, found materials to create a suggestion of a narrative into which she inserts her video works. Characters and invented personas play a vital role in her practice, often advancing a narrative through the means of a storytelling song or appearing in an adjunct animation. The strong narrative elements to Reed’s work –even when opaque or obtuse- underscore both her interest and skills in related art forms such as music and theatre. For example, in addition to an established career as a pop musician, she is currently appearing in a new production of ‘Tosca’ at Berlin’s prestigious Volksbuhne. Reed is currently working on a number of substantial new art works using a not dissimilar production method. A work currently in production in the Azores will see her attempt a personal remake of Kenneth Anger’s ‘Scorpio Rising’. Another work is entitled “when the gods came down to the earth and i chose my place in the food chain”. In it, she will play all the narrative roles, male and female, acted out against blue-screen and edited together. Part of the research for this work – Reed’s interest in occult and mystical traditions such as branches of Gnosticism and Byzantine era cults that depicted Christ as highly androgynous or even a hermaphrodite- has spawned other works such as diptychs and triptychs of digital prints and assemblage installations. These works combine her art historical references with her equal interest in all things esoteric and mind-altering, such as the obvious Erich von Däniken connection. The visual presentation alludes as much to her lifelong attraction to kitschy subcultural aesthetics as the actual science at the heart of great mysteries of the universe.
Michelle Deignan
The Irish artist MICHELLE DEIGNAN works almost exclusively with video. Deignan’s works, which utilize her industry-level technical skills, read very much as real television programmes at first glance. But, of course, they are fake. Often deploying the familiar devices of recognizable television – the microphone-holding roving reporter of reportage, for example- Deignan eschews any seductive aesthetics in order to create video works that read, visually, as credible and familiar genres of prosaic television; reportage and current affairs being the two most prevalent with a recent foray into appropriating imagery and presentation styles from low-grade ‘public infomerical’ programming aimed at promoting cultural diversity. Deignan herself or actors assume the roles of reporters or the ‘talking heads’ of low-budget documentary programmes, their speech patterns perfectly mimicking the familiar patterns of speech that we associate with such genres. We are, as far as we can tell, watching a bone fide piece of television. However, very soon, as we listen to the unfolding reports, we realize that we are not. Snippets of possibly evidenced history, third person reporting on anecdotes from Deignan’s personal life and blatant misinformation vie for place in the amusing and rambling scripts. We are deftly kept wondering which bits of what is being reported to us, combined with the familiar banal imagery, is false or true. Deignan constructs a discourse that uses a facsimile of the actual to raise questions about the nature of truth, misinformation and manipulation in what is considered to be the actual and factual media. Alienation devices pop up here and there, constant barriers against seduction or failing to remember that what we are watching, like all constructed media, can never be the objective reality that we, lapsing, sometimes assume it is. Rather than adopting a didactic or exaggerated parody style, Deignan invents a hybrid form that manages to capture the goodwill often freely offered by the audience towards satire with the guarded critical eye that clever work addressing formal structures of media is also able to nurture.
Deborah Schamoni
DEBORAH SCHAMONI is a German artist and filmmaker based in Berlin whose practice bisects traditional film and video genres (for example, she has made pop videos and other short film projects for many of Berlin’s leading pop and underground groups) and artist’s film. One of the founding members of the Hamburg Isotrop Academy, Schamoni also has the curation of the third cycle of the influential A-Clip project (that saw political and artistic interventions parasited into traditional cinemas) under her belt. In short, Schamoni is not the kind of artist we would expect to be unfamiliar with playing with artifice or either acknowledged or unacknowledged artificiality. Yet, in her latest offering, ‘Dead Devils Death Bar’, scripted together with Judith Hopf, we see her playing visual, textual and gestural games with overt artificiality and visible fallacy that are, perhaps, far more akin to the discourses of artists’ cinema than the world of the short film circuit. This does not mean that the screen experience appears as rough and ready. On the contrary, Schamoni’s professional filmmaking skills are exploited to full potential to give a slick and seamless quality to the resulting film. But, if we think we are sitting down to a piece of traditional narrative cinema, we are quickly asked to think again as characters burst into song or gender appears to be switched. Schamoni’s film undoubtedly and accurately parodies the would-be intellectual late-night ramblings of Berlin’s arty bohemian set as anyone who has hung around Mysliwska after two in the morning can testify. And everywhere is the fragrance of Fassbinder. Naturally, this is intentional. Within the gentle vehicle of parody, there is nonetheless a serious contemplation of the way in which Fassbinder in particular –and the broader German cinema and theatre tradition in general- contribute to the construction of the identity for the Bohemian artist, a tradition in Germany that dates back to Romanticism. So accurate is the parody whilst implying a level of falseness to the characters presented that we are, in turn, prompted to question the whole notion of the Bohemian. Like many excellent parodies, the lines between reality and artifice become blurred. Are we, for example, to read the overt gender reversal or willful signing as some form of critique or is it just another example of an accurate Berlin Bohemian reality? Again, as anyone who has schlepped through certain bars in Kreuzberg can testify, a man in a dress or a suit-wearing woman referred to with male pronouns would barely raise an eyebrow; less up-market metrosexuality and more like something of a local commitment to support the kinds of memes associated with the city’s underground pedigree.
Ken Pratt © 2008