COPENHAGEN.- Experience compelling artworks and music videos in a major exhibition that speaks to the eyes and ears, vocal cords and sense of rhythm. Contemporary art meets pop music in the special exhibition MY MUSIC at
ARKEN in a sensual explosion of music video, video art, sculpture, painting and installation.
In recent years there has been a wealth of encounters between music and art. Pop music and visual art unfold through each other’s artistic and commercial modes of expression and serve up sparkling as well as acerbic and humorous comments on our society and the ideals in which we reflect ourselves. The exhibition MY MUSIC takes a close look at this creative encounter and shows art and music videos by among others Lady Gaga, Pipilotti Rist, Candice Breitz, Marilyn Minter, Katy Perry and Jesper Just.
Self-worship in modelling clay
The Swedish video artist Nathalie Djurberg’s modelling-wax animation Worship from 2016 offers a rich tapestry of obscene scenes to the inciting electronic sounds of the musician Hans Berg. Women amorously flaunt their charms and men on motorbikes cultivate their own sex factor in a ridiculous, grotesque display of gaudy body fetishism and ‘bling’ as found in YouTube’s music video streaming. Pop music also skirts visual art by recycling the motifs and ideas of contemporary art. This goes for example for Lady Gaga, who in the sophisticated music video for Born This Way from 2011 draws directly on the French artist ORLAN’s plastic-surgery performance art.
Fan culture and self-image
MY MUSIC is not only about art and pop music. It is also about us who consume them and make them part of our life and self-understanding – as in the South African artist Candice Breitz’ video installation QUEEN (A Portrait of Madonna) from 2005, in which 30 devoted Madonna fans each give their own singing and gesticulating versions of Madonna’s greatest hits and thus show us Madonna as she is seen, experienced and lived out by her fans.
Beyond the walls of the museum
MY MUSIC also unfolds outside the walls of the museum in the form of short, pop-up exhibitions in the shopping mall Rødovre Centrum and in the digital art hall DIAS at Vallensbæk Station. MY MUSIC has been organized in close collaboration with young people from Ishøj Youth School, who have helped to develop the content, presentation and design of the exhibition. MY MUSIC can be experienced at ARKEN from 7 October 2017 until 25 March 2018.
Featuring: Lady Gaga, Pipilotti Rist, Candice Breitz, Marilyn Minter, Katy Perry, Sia, Beck & Jeremy Blake, Die Antwoord & Roger Ballen, The Hours, Damien Hirst, Elton John & Sam Taylor-Johnson, Jesper Just, Micha Klein, Martin Creed, Nathalie Djurberg & Hans Berg, Ditte Ejlerskov, Tim Noble & Sue Webster, Jacob Bellens & Rikke Benborg, Blondage and Adel Abidin.
