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Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Keith Hennessy & Jassem Hindi at Sophiensaele

Last night our friend Keith Hennessy from San Francisco performed "Untitled / improvised sound + action" at Sophiensaele Berlin in a collaboration with his companion, sound artist Jassem Hindi from Paris.
Watching Keith's performances over the years, I was not surprised by his radical, full-on, intense, political, anarchist, queer and risk taking performance. But this time he got me (and the rest of the audience) in awe and at the edge of our seats by doing a crazily and breathtaking circus balancing act with a clothing rack, see pictures below. At one point I really thought he was gonna smack to the floor and crush part of the audience... But of course he pulled it off. Phew.
Dressed from head to toe in an Versace-for-H&M-outfit, like a human clothes hanger, with suspense soundscapes from Jassem in the background... Wow, if that ain't punk!
After that he got us joining him, ranting at 'bankers who haven't been prosecuted for their financial crimes, while thousands of peaceful protesters have been arrested in the last months', by demonstrating the human microphone, the Occupy Wallstreet method of transferring speeches to larger audiences without electronic devices, just by repeating the speaker's sentences one by one. 

Keith is currently working on a group piece called 'Turbulence / a dance about the economy'. This piece is 'a bodily response to economic crisis'. I already saw some very promising and inspiring work in progress and I can't wait to see the final piece. Check his website: http://www.circozero.org








Keith Hennessy (hanging, center back) and Jassem Hindi (foreground right)


All photos © Michiel Keuper

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Stripes ⁄⁄⁄⁄⁄

Warsaw, october 2009

San Francisco, october 2011

Gallery window, Berlin, september 2011


Minneapolis, september 2011

San Francisco, october 2011

Stolzenhagen, summer 2011


All photos © Michiel Keuper 2009, 2011

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Club Donny # 7 / Latest Issue

Stolzenhagen, Brandenburg, Germany, 2010 - photo © Michiel Keuper

The picture above I took last summer in the countryside North-East of Berlin. Unlike this year's summer, last year's had way more sun but, obviously in this photo showing trees flooded by the river Oder, also lots of water. My photo now made it in the latest issue of Club Donny.
Club Donny is a 'strictly unedited journal on the experience of nature in the urban environment', made by my friend Frank Bruggeman together with Samira Ben Laloua and Ernst van der Hoeven. 
Frank is an inspiring artist/designer/botanist/florist/collector in his own right, whose work I admire a lot. Check his website here.

Club Donny #7 will be launched on september 25th in the Rotterdamse Schouwburg, Rotterdam, the Netherlands and will be on display in specialist bookstores (check here).
For more info: www.clubdonny.com


Club Donny #7 - cover


21 october 2011 - Update/ Via facebook/clubdonny:
"Club Donny photo: Stolzenhagen (Michiel Keuper 2010), featured in new art column by Maria Barnas in Vrij Nederland, 8 oktober 2011"

Pages in Club Donny #7, october 2011 - via facebook/clubdonny

Thursday, August 04, 2011

The Head and the Heart / Winter Song




For the time of year. A mildly ironic video with a beautiful acoustic version of 'Winter Song' from their self-titled debut album 'The Head and the Heart', re-released in april 2011. Check em out, they're a great indie folk band.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Work in progress / The State of Things - studio time

The State of Things - work in progress, july 2011, photo © Michiel Keuper


The State of Things - visual art performance: friday july 15th, 19h at Neurotitan Galerie, Rosenthalerstrasse 39, HH 1st floor, Berlin Mitte. With Maria F. Scaroni, Vania Rovisco, Dania Burger and Michiel Keuper.

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

The State of Things at AADKunexpected / program

On friday july 15th I will take part in The State of Things, a visual art performance together with Maria F. Scaroni, Vania Rovisco and Dania Burger.
It will start at 19h at Neurotitan Galerie, Rosenthalerstrasse 39 in Berlin Mitte. It is one of 21 projects to be presented during the 4-day festival AADKunexpected. Please check the rest of the program below.
Pictures will follow soon.



The program:


The locations:



Saturday, July 02, 2011

Trailer / The State of Things @ AADKunexpected, friday july 15th 2011




On friday july 15th, I will be performing as invited guest together with Dania Burger, in a follow up of The State of Things with Maria F. Scaroni and Vania Rovisco, a durational installation/performance at Neurotitan Galerie in Berlin Mitte, starting at 7pm till 8.30pm. The performance is part of  the 4-day event AADKunexpected.

From the AADK-website: On the 14th of July 2011 the artistic platform AADK (AADK Berlin Gbr) is launching AADKunexpected, a 4-day event presenting various projects (performance, music, live- sound- and visual-installations, exhibition, literature) in various locations in Berlin. 25 artists will show their most recent work in Galerie Neurotitan/Eschschloraque, Podewil, Galerie Torstrasse 161, Uferstudios and Leap. 
Check www.aadk.org for more details.



Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Girl in a coma / Series on paper

'Girl in a Coma I', 2010 - acrylic on paper, 24x30cm - © Michiel Keuper


'Girl in a Coma II', 2010 - acrylic on paper, 24x30cm - © Michiel Keuper


'Girl in a Coma III', 2010 - acrylic on paper, 24x30cm - © Michiel Keuper


'Girl in a Coma IV', 2010 - acrylic on paper, 24x30cm - © Michiel Keuper

Series of quick paintings with acrylic on paper, at the end the day, with left overs of paint. After a photo of a 9 year old girl in a coma, being in a vegetative state for years. I had this photo stuck on my wall for a long time, fascinated by this state of being and not-being.


Wednesday, May 04, 2011

Live at KEXP Seattle / The Tallest Man On Earth




Ok, I'm tempted to copy all of the 6 videos from this live concert in this post, but you better look for them online. Instead a selection of my favorites. Listen to the complete audio of this 30 minute concert here: http://feeds.kexp.org/~r/kexp/liveperformances/~5/yvJ75dadj7E/3b6663d6-a1d8-411f-9bcc-3a1d35bd994e.mp3 Also you can download this as a podcast from the KEXP website, here (look in the right 'on demand'-column). The KEXP youtube channel, with a lot more other interesting studio live tracks, you find here.

Back to The Tallest Man... aka Kristian Matsson, the singer/songwriter from Sweden... indeed he is an amazing guitar player and certainly has a Greatest voice... And gosh, do I now wish I'd learned to play the guitar as a teenager, instead of the saxophone... dammit!






Monday, May 02, 2011

Kinetics / Cory Arcangel's dancing shelves at Hamburger Bahnhof




In january I saw this kinetic installation of 2 pairs of dancing shelves by Cory Arcangel in Hamburger Bahnhof. The 'soundtrack' in the clip is coming from his video installations, one of them featuring Jimi Hendrix playing his guitar. In the clip you see a glimpse of that on a monitor on the wall.
The heart of the exhibition (still up till 28 august 2011) is the two-screen installation 'a couple thousand short films about Glenn Gould' from 2007. Arcangel's video version of the 1st Variation from Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations, entirely constructed from downloaded youtube material.


Cory Arcangel - a couple thousand short films about Glenn Gould, 2007
© Courtesy the artist and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris/Salzburg


"Compiled from over 1100 individual snippets that the artist downloaded off the Internet and edited using software that he himself devised, we are treated to a video version of the 1st variation from Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations. At a bewildering speed, the images alternate from person to person as each individual plays a completely different instrument, each time performing a single note from Bach's composition. The pianist Glenn Gould used the technique of piecing together various recordings to produce his commercial records, something which Archangel takes here to its humorous extreme." (via website Hamburger Bahnhof)


Cory Arcangel - a couple thousand short films about Glenn Gould, 2007
© Courtesy the artist and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris/Salzburg



Juxtapositions / And the series continues... on a separate blog

Peter Lindbergh - 1994

Paul Strand - 1951



Since I started the juxtapositions-series, it has become a story on its own. It turns out to be addictive to find matching pairs of paintings, photographs or other works of art, that somehow relate to each other. Sometimes from different disciplines, sometimes from different eras. The one inspired by the other...? Intentional quoting...? Subconscious coincidence...? Homage...? Zeitgeist...? Not that it really matters, good art is good art I suppose, yet it is fascinating to discover parallels and connections. 
Just couldn't stop and still can't. However, since I intended this blog to have a personal character, whether it is by posting my own work, or indirectly by posting stuff that interests me, or by sharing my thoughts, the juxtapositions seem to be playing a slightly different role. Sure they show my vision, or my artistic preferences for that matter, since I'm the one who juxtaposes, but apart from that, it generally is not my own work, nor do I put any comments other than creating a dialogue between the images by juxtaposing them. So, in order not to confuse, I decided to create a separate blog. From now on, if you're interested, please check mfk / juxtapositions for regular updates.


www.mfk-juxtapositions.blogspot.com



Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Self reflection / Manet's 'Le Déjeuner dans l'Atelier' from 1868

self reflected in Manet's 1896 'Le Dejeuner dans l'Atelier' - photo mfk

Last week I spent a lot of time in museums in Munich and Stuttgart doing research. Mondrian/de Stijl, Cy Twombly, Alex Katz, Isaac Julien's 9-screen-video-installation 'Ten Thousand Waves', Michaël Borremans to name but a few exhibitions, and of course I was with my nose on top of some masters too. Here is proof. (click to enlarge)


Édouard Manet - 'Le Dejeuner dans
l'Atelier', 1868, close up - photo mfk


Édouard Manet - 'Le Dejeuner dans l'Atelier', 1868 - oil on
canvas - Neue Pinakothek, Munich - via rasiel.com




Saturday, April 16, 2011

Juxtapositions VII / Chuck Samuels & Helmut Newton

Chuck Samuels - After Newton, 1991 - with Sylvia Poirier, from the series Before the Camera

Helmut Newton - Jenny Capitain, Pension Dorian, Berlin 1977


Monday, April 11, 2011

Hands on / Lauren Hutton, Richard Gere & Tumblr

Lauren Hutton and Richard Gere at the premiere of 'American Gigolo', 1980

photo by Knotan for Sang Bleu via sangbleu.tumblr

























yup. nice hand. nice tattoo.


Wednesday, April 06, 2011

Under the Radar / paintings & drawings

'Man and Horse', 2011, detail - oil on canvas

On march 25th I presented paintings and works on paper at 'Under the Radar' at RufReaktor, an environment for local and international artists, located on the attic of an old brewery in Berlin-Friedrichshain. The evening featured 2 DJ's, 3 bands and 4 artists. I put up a selection of drawings on magazines and some recent paintings that followed out of magazine drawings. Also I put up a big scale painting on paper that I'd done in the fall and that I'd forgotten about until I saw the RufReaktor space. I think it suited the place and the event.

Under the Radar, overview - march 2011

Under the Radar - march 2011


from the series 'Past Present (Past Presence)', 2010/11 - acrylic, ink on magazine 

'Man and Horse', 2011 - oil on canvas, 40x50cm

Under the Radar - march 2011


No title (reclining), 2011 - acrylic on canvas, 70x90cm

No title (reclining), 2011, detail - acrylic on canvas

Under the Radar, march 2011 - overview

'Joker (Boy)', 2011 - oil on canvas, 46x60cm

'Joker (Boy)', 2011, detail - oil on canvas


Under the Radar, audience - march 2011

Under the Radar, overview - march 2011

all photo's © Michiel Keuper 2011