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21/7/2007

Two exhibitions

Lingen Kunsthalle, Lingen

Anastasia Khoroshilova
Islanders

Born in Moscow in 1978, photographer Anastasia Khoroshilova focuses her work on the people of modern-day Russia and the countryside where they live. The artist, who lives in Berlin now, will be showing extensive photographic series in the Lingen Kunsthalle which she has produced during the past six years. One of Khoroshilova's reference points is Sergei Lobovikov. The Lingen Kunstverein mounted an exhibition of works by this early "Russian Master of Art Photography" as far back as 1995, availing of loans from Russian museums. His vintage prints, dating back to the early 20th century, also focus on people (primarily peasants who just a few years earlier had been in serfdom) as well as the countryside of his era.

Anastasia Khoroshilova studied in Germany, where she also launched her career. She is part of a phenomenon which contemporary Russian critics term the "post-diaspora". The term refers to artists who, while working and establishing themselves on the international stage, do not view themselves as emigrants: instead, these artists not only emphasise their Russian identity, but also incorporate it into their work. Such a holistic and simultaneously complex identity is new to Russian culture which, during the last century, presented intellectuals with a stark choice between remaining in their native country, with all its isolationist tendencies, and emigrating.

In a statement on her series "The Bezhin Meadow", Anastasia Khoroshilova writes: "I have selected episodes from Russian cultural history […] to form the narrative foundations. They are all characterised by the authors' striving to understand the phenomenon posed by the world of the Russian peasant. The first of these episodes includes Ivan Turgenev's "Notes of a Hunter" and (in particular) his short story "The Bezhin Meadow". The second episode refers to Sergei Eisenstein’s film "The Bezhin Meadow", which was banned and destroyed by Stalin, while the final episode references Vladimir Sorokin's novel simply entitled "A Novel". All these works deal in different ways with the life of Russian peasants -- and of living in the country. They were all created during a transitionary phase of Russian history which was replete with social contradictions. This forms the starting point for my work."

Regarding her series "Islanders", from which this exhibition takes its name, she says: "Having once attended a German boarding school, I came up with the idea of photographing people outside their world - outside their home - and engaging with the life of those who have exchanged their own home for community living. For all such people, this is a time-dependent condition which can either be bridged or enjoyed: Some people voluntarily spend their time in certain institutions, others are there to pursue a (career-related) goal. Yet others find themselves in an institution because there is no longer a way out. Whether one is in an orphanage, intent on seeking refuge from the outside world, or privileged to train at a ballet boarding school - the traces of this time will remain forever in the psyche and inner lives of such people."

The extensive exhibition in Lingen includes works from the artist's most important series. The exhibition can be viewed during the Kunsthalle

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Mai Yamashita + Naoto Kobayashi
1000 Waves

"1000 waves" is the title of the latest video work by this pair of artists, born in Tokyo in 1974 and 1976 respectively. 1000 waves – counted and numbered in writing. Mai Yamashita, who completed her studies at the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music in 2004, and Naoto Kobayashi, who graduated two years earlier from the same institute, are two artists who take their time. "Infinity", a work created last year, records a joint activity conducted by the artists during which they ran continuously across a lawn tracing the shape of a figure-of-eight - a symbol of infinity - until their tracks had become embedded in the bare earth. The tracks will remain visible even after the grass has re-grown over them. Playing with time and taking it to the limits of the absurd is a central theme of their joint work. To cite a third video example, they digitally prolong the descent of a shooting star for two minutes to give themselves sufficient time to record all Mai Yamashita’s wishes. In this way, a children’s game is presented with adult seriousness, lovingly caricaturing the insatiableness of human desire. In a society where time is money, and every action is designed to consume the minimum time possible, Yamashita and Kobayashi hold up a mirror to ourselves, illustrating the absurdity of such an approach with friendly mockery.

Mai Yamashita and Naoto Kobayashi have devised actions which are not only highly poetic but also intellectually incisive, transforming them into videos which are quickly absorbed by the viewer. Often, we watch these videos with a benign smile, as in the case of a bright red boiled sweet, the size of a football, being transformed into a tiny stickless lollypop the size of a cherry – all within 3.22 minutes. This is the time it takes, and visitors to the exhibition should take the time not only to view the video works produced by the two Japanese artists, but also to visit the parallel photographic exhibition by Russian artist Anastasia Khoroshilova which is being mounted in the Kunsthalle: both exhibitions require time and reflection.

The video works by Mai Yamashita and Naoto Kobayashi can be viewed in the Kunsthalle’s ‘Kabinett’

Image: Anastasia Khoroshilova, Islanders

Lingen Kunsthalle
Kaiserstraße, 49809 Lingen
Tue, Wed, Fri 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.; Thu 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.; Sat, Sun 11 a.m. – 5 p.m. Free guided tours: Thursdays at 6.30 p.m., Sundays at 11.30 a.m.
Free entrance on Thursdays from 6 p.m. Entrance: € 3, concession € 1.50.

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