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13/9/2002

Magnus Wallin

Malmo Konsthall, Malmo

SOLO/Physical Sightseeing

The exhibition consists of newly produced Lambda prints, Solo and computer-animated films from the 1997-2000 series Physical Sightseeing: Exit, Limbo, Physical Paradise and Skyline.

A violent firestorm surges up a long corridor. A number of handicapped and disabled human figures are trying in vain to escape the flames. Every time the fire surrounds and burns a victim, increasing applause is heard. Athletically built men swing in trapezes out into space and are crushed against a high tower. They fall in pieces down to the dissecting table in an anatomical theatre.

Magnus Wallin uses the imagery of computer games in his films, but they are about the human body and its physique, and how the body was and is depicted and perceived in former times and today. The observer is struck by the intensity of the short film sequences and Wallins subjective approach to the vulnerability of people who deviate from the norm. Two body types are contrasted with each other. In Skyline, the heroicized athletic bodies obediently throw themselves out into empty space. We are delighted by the musculature of the perfect body; we watch and praise it in sports arenas; we let it seduce us in advertising and fashion, but we also watch it perish in the gladiatorial games of our age. In contrast to this, we are shown the limping, deviating figures who are vainly and in panic trying to save themselves from the pursuing fire in Exit. The figures represent the bodies which we often choose to be blind to: the deformed and unusable that we feel forced to hide, correct, tame and adapt. We see the body as good or evil, beautiful or ugly, suitable to a purpose or worthless. What is perfect is an expression of divine harmony; what deviates too much from the ruling ideal of beauty and works badly or not at all frightens us. A body that deviates is one which rebels and exposes hierarchies, and which challenges our preconceptions.

Magnus Wallin works with 3D animation, a medium that is usually associated with computer games and the entertainment industry. In his works he does not strive for realism in the true meaning of the word. Instead he explores how we create concepts and ideologies by using and reusing images; Hieronymus Bosch, Leni Riefenstahls films and psychedelic visions of paradise are mixed together freely and naturally. They are reawakened to life and, without being categorised or evaluated, are brought into todays visual culture, becoming an expression of how we now interpret and experience the human body. But we are still also influenced by ideas from past times.

Magnus Wallin has chosen to use his medium in order to also be able to explore and comment on how it is used in our culture. By using the form of expression that is now one of the most frequently used in popular culture, instead of a more traditional artistic technique, he brings his art and message directly into the age in which we live. Magnus Wallin was born in 1965 in Kåseberga. He lives and works in Malmö. He studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen from 1989 to 95 and has strong ties with Denmark. In recent years he has participated in several major prestigious events including in 2001 the Venice Biennale and the Istanbul Biennial.

Information: Phone +46 (0)40 34 12 94

MALMO KONSTHALL
Box 17127
SE-200 10 Malmo
Sweden
tel +46 40 34 12 94
fax +46 40 30 15 07

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