VÆKST 1: Ida Brockmann “A soft spot for hardware”
VÆKST var en udstillingsserie fra september 2021 til marts 2022, der kritisk undersøgte vores samfunds fokus på vækst, effektivisering og udvikling. I Villa Kulturs orangeri — et væksthus for planter - forgrenede fem udstillinger sig, skabt af unge danske billedkunstnere fra det såkaldte vækstlag i Danmark. Under kronen af et kæmpe figentræ, indrammet af marmorfliser og store vinduespartier, rykkede kunstværker skabt af beton, marmor, plastik, LED, lyd, video og tekstiler ind, og skabte nye fortællinger på tværs af tid og sted. Fra renæssancen til samtiden, fra Zanzibar til Danmark, på hospitalet, til før-festen og på en rejse ud i rummet og dybt ned i historien. VÆKST blev støttet af Roskilde Festival Fonden, Slots- og Kulturstyrelsen, Østerbro Lokaludvalg, Statens Kunstfond, Snabslanten og Dansk Tennis Fond.
In English below
Gennem bearbejdning af sten og digitale ikoner skildrer billedkunstner Ida Brockmann (f. 1991) vores teknologiske hverdag. Udstillingen er den første i udstillingsserien VÆKST, der inviterer unge vækstlagskunstnere til at reflektere over vores fokus på vækst i samfundet. Som den første i rækken stiller Brockmann skarpt på vores konstante udvikling af nye teknologier og voksende tilhørsforhold til dem.
I midten af villaens orangeri ligger værket IMG_1103.jpg (2019), som består af en ubegribelig stor mængde binære koder indgraveret på lertavler i en absurd leg mellem tusinder af år gamle analoge babylonske kommunikationsformer og de sidste årtiers fremvoksende digitale tablets. Tilsammen udgør indskriften i lertavlerne den præcise kode for billedet IMG_1103.jpg på Brockmanns egen tablet. Hun har således materialiseret det digitale billede, hvilket har gjort det uigenkendeligt, som en undersøgelse af idéen om det digitale og dets indvirkning på vores perception.
Langs orangeriets bænke løber relieffet Step by step, brick by brick (2021) af gasbeton, der gengiver screenshots af en YouTube tutorial, hvor store hænder reparerer en smadret smartphone i et omsorgsfuldt møde mellem mennesker og byggeklodser. Denne nærhed og forbindelse mellem menneske, teknologi og natur, går igen i værket High resolution (2021), hvor det digitale ikon for ”billede”, et landskab med to bjergtoppe og en sol, er indgraveret i en stak stablede stenplader, som samlet også mimer ikonet for ”billedgalleri”. Udover den genkendelige digitale semiotik, er værkets materiale også er et landskab i sig selv: ”et tværsnit over millioner af års sedimentære aflejringer”, som Brockmann kalder det, hvor organiske partikler og mineraler ophobes og sætter sig på plads. Det er netop i tværsnittet over teknologiens historie, semiotik, naturens materialer og processer, at Brockmanns værker afslører, hvordan vækst som samfundssymptomatisk træk er sammenviklet med teknologiens jordnærhed og kropsliggørelse.
Tekster skrevet af Ida Schyum & Nanna Saplana
Billeder taget af Niels Vogensen Biasevich
IMG_1103.jpg (2019)
Step by step, brick by brick (2021)
Om kunstneren
Ida Brockmann (f. 1991) er BA fra Valand Academy i Göteborg. Hun har senest udstillet på Boy Konsthall, Bollebygd, 2019, Skulpturpark Hollufgård, Odense, 2021, og på Galleria Sculptor, Helsinki, 2022.
Om kuratorerne
Ida Schyum (f.1992) er en dansk kunsthistoriker uddannet fra Københavns Universitet. Hun er kurator for Museet for Samtidskunst i Roskilde og har tidligere været kurator på O-Overgaden — Institut for Samtidskunst og Roskilde Festival, foruden at have kurateret freelance på Kunsthal Charlottenborg, ARoS, Alt_Cph20, Galleri Tom Christoffersen og Villa Kultur. Flere af hendes udstillinger er blevet hyldet som årets bedste i bl.a. Information, Kunsten.nu og Kunstkritikk samt præmieret af Statens Kunstfond.
Nanna Saplana (f. 1991) er en dansk cand.mag i Moderne Kultur uddannet fra Københavns Universitet og Visuel Antropologi fra Goldsmiths University i London. Hun er Gallery Director for Gas9Gallery på Vesterbro, København, og har tidligere arbejdet på Art Hub Copenhagen og O-Overgaden — Institut for Samtidskunst, foruden at have kurateret freelance på Nikolaj Kunsthal, @ Læderstræde og Villa Kultur.
High reselution (2021)
GROWTH 1: Ida Brockmann “A soft spot for hardware”
GROWTH was an exhibition series lasting from September 2021 to March 2022 that critically examined our society’s focus on growth, efficiency and development. In Villa Kultur’s greenhouse, five exhibitions branched out, each created by young Danish visual artists from the so-called ‘growth layer’ in Denmark. Under the crown of a giant fig tree and framed by marble tiles and large windows, works of art made from concrete, marble, plastic, sound, light, video and textiles moved in, creating new narratives across time and place. From the Renaissance to the present, from Zanzibar to Denmark, at the hospital, to the pre-party, and on a journey into space and deep into history. GROWTH was supported by Roskilde Festival Foundation, the Palaces and Culture Agency, Østerbro Local Committee, the Danish Arts Foundation, Snabslanten and the Danish Tennis Foundation.
Read more about GROWTH and the individual exhibitions here. GROWTH did also include a series of concerts curated by Laurits Heegard. Read more about the artists here.
By processing stones and digital icons, visual artist Ida Brockmann depicts our everyday technological life. For this first exhibition in the GROWTH series, Brockmann sheds light on our constant development of new technologies and growing affiliation with them.
In the middle of the Villa’s orangery, the work IMG_1103.jpg (2019) is placed. Consisting of an incomprehensibly large number of codes engraved in clay tablets, the work reveals an absurd play between thousands-of-years-old analogue communication methods from Babylonian times and the emerging digital tablets of recent decades. The inscription manifests the code for the image file IMG_1103.jpg on Brockmann’s own tablet, which she has materialised but thus made unrecognisable. Consequently, by translating the image into clay tablets, Brockmann explores the digital and its impact on our perception.
Along the walls of the orangery, the sculpture series Step by Step, Brick by Brick (2021) features aerated concrete reliefs that mimic screenshots of a YouTube tutorial in which large hands repair a smashed smartphone in the careful meeting constituted by the act of reparation. This closeness between man, technology and nature is repeated in the work High Resolution (2021), in which the digital icon representing ‘image’ – a landscape with mountain peaks and a sun – is engraved in stacked stone slabs, which together make up the ‘image gallery’ icon. In addition to the recognisable digital semiotics, the material of the work is also a landscape in itself: ‘A cross-section of millions of years of sedimentary deposits’, as Brockmann describes it, where organic particles and minerals accumulate and settle. Precisely by crossing the history of technology, its semiotics, natural materials, and processes, Brockmann’s work reveals how society’s symptomatic traits of growth and progression are intertwined with the Earth and the embodiment of technology.
Texts by Ida Schyum & Nanna Saplana
Photos by Niels Vogensen Biasevich
About the artist
Ida Brockmann (b. 1991) graduated from Valand Aca- demy in Gothenburg. She most recently exhibited at Boy Konsthall, Bollebygd in 2019, Skulpturpark Hollufgård, Odense in 2021 and Galleria Sculptor, Helsinki, 2022.
About the curators
Ida Schyum (b. 1992) is a Danish art historian educated at the University of Copenhagen and a curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Roskilde. She was previously a curator at O-Overgaden — Institute of Contemporary Art and Roskilde Festival, as well as a freelance curator at Kunsthal Charlottenborg, ARoS, Alt_Cph20, Galleri Tom Christoffersen, and Villa Kultur. Her exhibitions have been selected as the best of the year in Information, Kunsten.nu, and Kunstkritikk as well as awarded by the Danish Arts Council.
Nanna Saplana (b. 1991) has a master’s degree in Modern Culture from the University of Copenhagen and is a graduate of Visual Anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London. She is Gallery Director for Gas9Gallery on Vesterbro, Copenhagen, and has previously worked at Art Hub Copenhagen and O-Overgaden — Institute of Contemporary Art, in addition to curating freelance at Nikolaj Kunsthal, @Læderstræde, and Villa Kultur.