Junger Ankauf
Juliette Blightman - Collective Nouns und Time and Death (some say sex)
2016
Juliette Blightman (*1980 in Farnham, UK) lives and works in London and Berlin. In 2007, she received her MFA from the Byam Shaw School of Art. The primary focus of her works is the relationship between art and life, between the private and the public. Her works are developed like ongoing diary entries, for which she uses various media, including photography, drawing, painting, text, video and installation.
Collective Nouns, 2015
The installation Collective Nouns consists of a three-metre-high palm tree, a framed photograph and a subwoofer. Upon approaching the installation, one is first irritated by the undulating sound of techno beats that pours out of the subwoofer and makes the leaves of the plant gently sway. The photograph depicts a small naked girl shot from behind, who plays in a bidet in a bathroom lined with marble tiles. The private atmosphere of this image is underscored by the large green palm tree, which one often finds as a decorative plant in private flats, as well as in offices and greenhouses. The viewer becomes part of the scenery, which could be the location of a past or forthcoming event: Private experiences merge with impressions from club life. We know, for example, that the sound was recorded in the Berlin nightclub Berghain; while, according to the artist, the girl is her daughter Eve. The result is a strange atmosphere of simultaneous presence and absence: Where does private life begin, where does public life end? Is it about missed places or moments? Such questions lie at the core of Blightman’s works, in which she time and again takes her role as mother and artist as her central theme.
Time and Death (some say sex), 9.37 min., 2015
The one channel video piece Time and Death (some say sex) from 2015 collages video clips and photographs, as well as pencil and coloured drawings, in loose order to create one continuous video: At the beginning, one sees drawings of various interior spaces, followed by a party scene captured on video and a photograph of two people sleeping on a sofa in the same room, who could be seen earlier on the dance floor. The stringing together of images is reminiscent of the way we often flip through photos on smartphones in everyday life. From the middle of the video, one can hear an instrumental version of the song ‘Temptation’ by New Order, a new wave and post-punk band from Manchester. Blightman creates a nostalgic atmosphere, the feeling of a melancholic look back in time, in which knowledge of transience resonates.