calendario eventi  :: 

X

7/12/2006

Jesper Just

Stedelijk Museum CS, Amsterdam

“As Virginia Woolf has put it in A Room of One’s Own, women need a place of their own to redefine the feminine existence without relating to the already existing definitions of relations to the man. So my point is that maybe it’s time for men to have a place like that as well..." Jesper Just, 2006

The second edition of DOCKING STATION, the new project space in Stedelijk Museum CS, presents three short films by Danish artist Jesper Just (Copenhagen, 1974): Invitation to Love (2003), The Lonely Villa (2004) and Something to Love (2005). Like Matthew Barney, Douglas Gordon and Francesco Vezzoli, in his films Just deploys a highly stylized visual language that references Hollywood cinema with which he scrutinizes notions of masculinity in popular culture. After the films of Daria Martin in the first DOCKING STATION, which dealt with themes like seduction, emotionality and identity from a feminine perspective, Just explores the opposite end of the spectrum.

Just is a rising star on the international art scene. His work reflects the art world’s recent interest in high production film values. After completing his studies at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen, Just began making short videos and 16 mm films in 2000. Until 2004, female characters were absent from his work - the roles were reserved for a male-only cast, leaving little scope to explore the customary dynamic between the sexes.

Just’s films are set in environments seeped in masculinity and virility - a gentleman’s club, a deserted harbour area, a strip joint. The male personages do not, however, conform to the stereotypical behaviour that traditionally informs intermale relationships. The artist jettisons the rules of the game, as it were, to see what unfolds. What if the cliche' is cast off and, rather than taking to their fists, men engage in a seductive dance, burst into tears or join together in close harmony singing?

Stripped of a linear narrative, Just’s films present ‘open’, ambiguous situations. There is little prolonged spoken dialogue; the action progresses through gaze, gesture and the occasional explosion of emotion.

Actor Johannes Lilleore takes the male lead in many of the films, serving to connect the different works. He is the catalyst for Just’s ongoing reappraisal and redefinition of traditional male roles and masculine identity. Female characters began to make an incidental appearance in Just’s films in 2004, such as Something to Love, from 2005. However, in this film the conventional screen kiss between man and woman is no dramatic climax but a mechanical ritual that leaves a residue of ambiguity and hollowness.

DOCKING STATION
Docking Station is the new project space of the Stedelijk Museum CS. It showcases the work of young international talent in a series of rapidly changing presentations. In 2007, the scheduled artists include Sean Snyder, Ryan Gander, Enrico David, Mario Garcia Torres and Florian Pumhosl, and others.

Contemporary
Just In Time. Municipal Art Acquisitions
1.12.06 - 11.03.07
'Just in Time' presents the proposals for the annual Municipal Art Acquisitions. This year the focus is on the visual arts. For the first time, the concept of the exhibition was placed in the hands of a guest curator: Maxine Kopsa.
The annual Municipal Art Acquisitions exhibitions allow for an overview of cultural activity in Amsterdam, in terms of visual art, photography, design and applied arts.

For more information: pressoffice@stedelijk.nl / +31 (0)20 573 2656

Stedelijk Museum CS
Post CS building, 2 storey, Oosterdokskade 5, Amsterdam
Open: daily from 10:00 a.m. through 6:00 p.m. Closed on January 1.
Entrance: Euro 9,00; reduced fee: Euro 4,50; children 0-7 years and MK: free

stampa

permanent link