Nothing, Video (2022)

Video, sound, 6'49 min, part of the exhibition Nothing at Rottstr5-Kunsthallen, Bochum, 2021, part of zat #7 at Salon des Amateurs, Düsseldorf, 2022, part of Rotunde im Hentrichhaus, artist association Malkasten Düsseldorf, 2023 and part of the group exhibition Tangible Absence at project 17717, Seoul, Republic of Korea, 2023.

Sound: Detlef Klepsch, performance: Lara Condercuri, Hani Mehdizadeh, Ji-Hun Park, camera: Taj Irzhavsky, production, text, editing: Anne Schülke, 2022

The video Nothing was created in the summer of 2021: three young people wore light-coloured clothes, moved through a room with Plexiglas bowls and met each other. Taj Irzhavsky took over the camera work. The sound is based on a rhythmic sequence by Detlef Klepsch and my voice. The video draws on the tradition of experimental film and pop-cultural elements such as music videos.

In November 2021, the work was part of my exhibition Nothing, curated by Roman Zheleznyak at the Rottstr5 Kunsthallen in Bochum. A year later, I extended the video with a text for a screening at the Salon des Amateurs nightclub in Düsseldorf. This version was last shown at Kunstverein Malkasten Düsseldorf in June and July 2023.

The extension is a manifesto-like text with reference to Herman Melville's story Bartelby: instead of hesitating and refusing, the text calls for action.

Nothing is part of a series of works that deal with body and space, image borders and imagination: Suture, White Balance, Nothing, Subcooled and Likeness (in process). I started this series after I worked on an essay about VALIE EXPORTs works.

The essay was published in 2017 under the title Dekonstruktion von Körper-/Zeichen by VALIE EXPORT in: Künstlerinnen schreiben. Selected contributions to art theory from three centuries edited by Renate Kroll and Susanne Gramatzki.