Per Hüttner Explained

Per Hüttner
Birth Date:11 February 1967
Birth Place:Oskarshamn, Sweden
Nationality:Swedish
Field:Installation art, photography, drawing, performance art, writing and curation
Movement:Conceptual Art
Training:Konsthögskolan Stockholm, Hochschule der Künste Berlin
Awards:Maria Bonnier Dahlins Stiftelse, IASPIS, Konstakademien Stockholm

Per Hüttner (born 11 February 1967) is a Swedish visual artist who lives and works in Paris. He is mostly known for his photographic work[1] and for his interactive, changing and travelling exhibition projects.[2] A number of monographs about his practice has been published including Per Hüttner[3] , 2003; I am a Curator[4] , 2004; Repetitive Time[5] 2006, Xiao Yao You[6] 2006, Democracy and Desire[7] 2007.[8] The Imminent Interviews 2010 and The Quantum Police 2011.[9]

Biography

Hüttner was born in Oskarshamn, Småland on 11 February 1967. His father Bengt, who was Jewish, died in a car accident in 1971[10] and he was brought up by his Protestant mother with his sister. He moved around Sweden until the age of 24 when he moved to Berlin to study. He studied at Hochschule der Künste in Berlin 1991 to 1992. He graduated from Konsthögskolan in Stockholm 1993.

His life has since been marked by nomadism and constant movement where travel and international dialogues are core to his life and practice.[11] He lived in London and Los Angeles until he created his base in Paris in 2002. Hüttner was one of the founders of the non-profit galleries Konstakuten in Stockholm (1996–2001) and The Hood Gallery in Los Angeles (2001–2003),[12] the former was one of the first artist initiated galleries in the country and was important in creating a culture of self-organisation of artists in Sweden.[13] He is also one of the founders of the residency programs Norrköping AIR [14] and initiator of the experimental research group Vision Forum.[15]

Works

Hüttner's work investigates impermanence as a global principle, especially how ideas of permanence and purity are used to perpetuate social, political and economical structures[16] and how that influences human communication and interaction.[17] The work often deals with transformation, change or various forms of transgressions of boundaries or borders.[18] The artist is inspired by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze and particularly interested in how the relationship between larger political, economical and social structures affect the individual and vice versa.[19] His work dialogues with the history of performance[20] and explores the genre in innovative ways by provoking the curiosity and imagination of the visitor as well as by reflecting on notions about time, knowledge and the human body.

In the late 1980s and 1990s much of Hüttner's installations used computers, video[21] and other new media.[22] He was one of the first artists to create installations that used computers as a sculptural element and at the same time allowing them to present vast and complex information.[23] The artist also used contemporary medical science to develop work based on research on the human brain at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, England - looking at how the brain remains in a constant state of change and regeneration. He also created exhibitions, publications and lectures with biochemist Elias Arnér that dealt with the relationship between art, science and the human body in Stockholm. In Begrepp - En Samling (Concepts a Collection) they brought together artists and scientists to dialogue about metaphysical questions.[24]

In the late 1990s Hüttner took his interdisciplinary experiences and implemented these into a series of exhibitions investigating the relationship between the art object and the exhibition.[25] In 2001 he co-curated an exhibition at Nylon with Goshka Macuga and Gavin Wade.[26] Other noteworthy exhibitions that dealt with these issues and that engaged the audience[27] in continuously reshaping the exhibition[28] include: I am a Curator[29] at Chisenhale Gallery in London,[30] Repetitive Time at The Art Museum in Gothenburg and Participate? at CEAC in Xiamen, China, and at Basekamp in Philadelphia.[31]

Parallel to this activity Hüttner created a photography project entitled "Jogging in Exotic Cities" where the artist went jogging repeatedly in far away cities that remain exotic to a western audience.[32] In the photographs we see the artist dressed in white clothes[33] as he makes his way through bustling cities like Chennai, Mexico City and Lusaka.[34] The project remains one of Hüttner's most well known to date. It has been shown in museums in the US,[35] Spain[36] Poland,[37] Romania,[38] Austria,[39] China[40] and Sweden.[41]

In 2004 he developed the performative aspects in the above-mentioned project and tied it back to a research about the limits of reality and documentary photography.[42] He developed a series of photographs where he created shrines of commemoration in busy street corners of urban centres around the world.[43] These impromptu sculptures suggested that an accident or act of violence had been committed in that specific place (while in fact they were fabricated by the artist). The work provoked complex discussions about differences and similarities between documentary traditions and the fictional.[44] This investigation into the very fabric of reality has moved to the forefront in the artist's mature work about impermanence and change. In the catalogue text to his 2006 exhibition Xiao Yao You that displayed a large body of the work at the Guangdong Museum of Art in Guangzhou the curator, Zhang Wei, writes:

Ceaseless movement is not a way of gaining ever more exotic knowledge of the world; it is rather a way of cleaning out and rediscovering the self. This is what I see in Per’s work. When I face his images, the reality presented in them seems less a true physical reality than an invisible psychological one. I see a negotiation and dialogue between the artist’s inner and outer worlds. In this psychological landscape, he describes his worries, his pursuit of human sentiment, and his insistent rejection of a stylized or superficial life. It makes me think of the Chinese philosopher Zhuang Zi's idea of xiao yao you or "moving carelessly". This philosophy does not only detail how to move freely across physical space, but is also a metaphor for how humans can transcend different kinds of obstacles and achieve a freedom of the spirit.[45]

The journey into the human soul was further developed in another photographic series from 2006 to 2007 entitled Democracy and Desire. The images were primarily shot at night with very long exposure times.[46] The relationship between the individual and its search for personal liberty from social conventions again comes to the forefront in the dreamlike photography.[47] In the catalogue text to the exhibition the work is discussed. In a typical style of the artist, it is hard to decipher who the author of the give text is and it even appears that the texts in different languages are written by different authors:

The uninhibited mental and/or physical space is very individual and extremely hard to define. But it is even more complicated, because this freedom can never be safe-guarded by consumerism, legislation or democracy than the self-confidence that feeds it can be defended by a law. As artists it is our prime responsibility to fight for the right to retain and enjoy this liberty for ourselves and others. This means that we need to have an extremely grounded belief in ourselves and the work that we do. Humanity will always be engaged in a battle to safeguard this freedom and maybe that is also a good definition of what an artist is – a confident defender of the aspects of the soul that cannot be defended any other way. It has always been like that throughout history.[48]

From 2007, Hüttner has returned both to a dialogue with science[49] and to working with video. In a sequel to Begrepp - En Samling from 1992, Hüttner and Arnér created a project entitled (In)Visible Dialogues which focused on a series of conversations between artists and scientists at Konstakademien in Stockholm, Sweden.[50] He also returned to these issues in a less direct way in solo exhibitions in France,[51] China,[52] England and Sweden. Installations such as "Do not Go Gentle",[53] "The Quantum Police" and "Imminent"[54] all depict eccentric people engaged in obsessive research. The work compels the visitor to reflect on whether it is meaningful to draw a line between reality and fiction. In her long text about the latter exhibition, the curator Cecilia Canziani shows how both the problematic of the singular and the collective, as well as myth and its ability influence reality, is highlighted in the artist's work:[55]

"In Plato’s Symposium, perhaps the best known of his dialogues, Aristofanes recounts that once upon a time, human beings had two heads, four arms, four legs, they were complete, a whole, a unity. Because of their arrogance they were punished by Zeus and divided in two halves: men and women. Since then, we look for completion in the other, and such- arguably - along as being a metaphor of love, also serves as a symbol of the dialectic between singularity and collectivity that informs the political organisation of society. In "Imminent" it is not just the narrative that is fragmented, but also the characters and their multiplied personae. Different actors are cast in the same role, sometime one character is transformed into another, reminding us of the quest for unity that Plato describes."

In the Quantum Police project, the above-mentioned problematic is taken even further. Here, the artist mixes (stolen or found?) police evidence material with interviews and fictional texts that describe elaborate conspiracy theories involving the police both in Europe and China. Delving deeper into questions of authenticity, the artist has also staged events that cross the boundaries of academic presentations, guided tours, and performance art. These have taken place at institutions like MACRO in Rome, CAPC in Bordeaux, Rockbund Art Museum in Shanghai, Tate Britain and Hayward Gallery in London and as part of experimental projects like The Invisible Generation[56] and the international research group OuUnPo.[57] Contrary to the video work, where the sound is subdued, Hüttner often uses music in the recent performances and installations in order to purposefully create paradoxical and misleading timelines.[58] These investigations into time, duration and the impermanent nature of knowledge have further been developed in an ongoing collaborative research with the Turkish writer/curator Fatos Üstek that started like a creative writing exchange in the Anglo-Austrian magazine Nowiswere[59] [60] [61] and that has led to interventions in museums like the Wacoal Art Center in Tokyo and Tate Modern in London[62] as well as in public spaces in New York City, Philadelphia, Porto,[57] Yokohama and Athens.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions and touring performances

Group exhibitions and performances

Monographs

Public collections

External links

Notes and References

  1. "A Western Runner," Laurent Devèze, Mare Articum 1, pp. 58–63, 2002, Poland
  2. Per Hüttner and Gavin Wade interviewed by Barnaby Drabble, Marianne Eigenheer (Hg.) Curating Critique, ICE Reader 1, 2008,
  3. Per Hüttner. Stockholm: Föreningen Curatorial Mutiny, 2004. . With a text by Duncan McLaren
  4. Per Hüttner: I am a Curator, 2005, 138 pages including 13 fold out colour pages, texts by Per Hüttner, Hannah Rickards, Celine Condorelli, Gavin Wade, Veronique Wiesinger, Duncan McLaren, Lisa LeFeuvre and Scott Rigby, language: English. Published by Chisenhale Gallery.
  5. Per Hüttner: Repetitive Time, 2006, 116 pages including 30 colour plates, texts by Lena Boëthius, Laurent Devèze, Per Hüttner, Claire Canning and Stéphanie Nava, language: English, design by Henrik Gistvall. Published by Göteborgs Konstmuseum.
  6. Per Hüttner: Xiao Yao You, 2006, 96 pages including 10 fold out colour pictures and multi-foldout cover, texts by Bo Nilsson and Zhang Wei, languages: English, Swedish and Chinese, design by byboth. Published by Guangdong Museum of Art.
  7. Per Hüttner: Democracy and Desire, 2007, 158 pages (A3) including 10 colour fold out pages. Languages: English, Swedish, Spanish and Rumanian. Design by Åbäke. Published by Vacio 9 and The Rumanian Cultural Institute.
  8. http://libris.kb.se/hitlist?d=libris&q=per+h%C3%BCttner&f=simp&spell=true&hist=true&p=1 List of publications by Hüttner at the Royal Library in Stockholm.
  9. The Quantum Police, with texts by Anne Klontz; Johnny Ross and Willie Hansen (1969) and a short story by Wang Xiao Ping (in Chinese and English). Design by Erik Månsson, 96 pages in full colour + 5 fold-out sheets. Published by Lambert Gallery and Vision Forum 2011, .
  10. Web site: Platform . 2009-05-16 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20090930024533/http://www.platform.fi/2002/huttner/index.html . 2009-09-30 .
  11. "Med världen som arbetsplats," Anders Olofsson, Konstperspektiv pp. 24–27; April 2002; Malmö, Sweden
  12. Springhill Institute Report on Activities, p. 110, The Springhill Institute, Birmingham, UK, 2007
  13. "How do we Keep on Meeting?," 9-10 Ottobre 1999, Oreste at The Venice Biennale, Italy, 1999
  14. http://norrkopingair.blogspot.ch/
  15. The Invisible Generation ed. Gerrie van Noord, Published by Vision Forum, Stockholm, Sweden.
  16. http://theinclusion.davidrobertsartfoundation.com/post/39924481600/per-huttner-shares-an-interview-and-his-essay-never Interview with the artist on David Roberts Art Foundation blog
  17. Web site: OuUnPo and Globalisation on Global Art and the Museum website . 2012-09-25 . https://web.archive.org/web/20131014132634/http://www.globalartmuseum.de/site/guest_author/323 . 2013-10-14 . dead .
  18. Intrude ART VS Per Hüttner, pp. 54–55, Intrude Art, Issue 04, 2008, published by Shanghai Zendai Museum of Modern Art Web site: Intrude: Art & Life 366 | 介入：艺术生活366天 . 2010-09-07 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110713050530/http://www.intrude366.com/en-US/intrude366/Project.aspx?articleid=254 . 2011-07-13 .
  19. Nick Muzyczka, Shanghai Global Times, Monday December 27, 2010
  20. "Filling the City with Dreams", errors, deceits, mistakes no 3, 2008, pp. 72–82, Cneai, Chatou, France
  21. Springhill Institute Report on Activities, pp. 32–39, The Springhill Institute, Birmingham, UK, 2007
  22. "Labyrinthen i Gdansk," Daniel Birnbaum, MAMA, p.30-31, September 1994, Stockholm, Sweden
  23. Reflektionen und Reaktionen, p. 42, published by Karl Hofer Gesellschaft, Berlin 1991
  24. "Elias Arnér and Per Hüttner," Tom Sandqvist, Siksi, January 1993, Helsinki, Finland
  25. Per Hüttner "It's good to Be an Artist Again" p. 211 Yugoslav Biennial of Young artists Vrsac 2004, Published by Centre for Contemporary Arts - Belgrade The book on WorldCat
  26. Neal Brown, 3 in 1 Curatorial Mutiny, Part 4, Frieze, Issue 60, June - August 2001.
  27. David Gauntlett, "Creative Explorations New Approaches to Identities and Audiences", pp. 119–20. Routledge, London, 2007
  28. "O'Neill, Paul, Art Monthly; Apr2004, Issue 275, p7-10
  29. http://www.stapletongrey.moonfruit.com/#/huttner-schorr/4543610556 C: International Contemporary Art, Wntr, 2004 by Fergal Stapleton
  30. pp. 111–164, pp. 263–279, Barnaby Drabble, Stop making Sense: The Ends of Curating and the Beginnings of the Exhibition, Thesis submitted to the Edinburgh College of Art in fulfilment Of the requirements of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2010
  31. A Tasty Treat, James Westcott, Zingmagazine 18; p.270-272; 2003; New York, USA
  32. Tank Book, Thames & Hudson; 2002; London, UK
  33. "TalePiece," Caroline Smith, Creative Camera, p.50-51, April–May 1999, London, UK
  34. "Artists on the Move," Duncan McLaren, Contemporary (magazine), p.56-61; June–August 2002, London, UK
  35. http://www.ybca.org/exhibitions/archive/ Yuerba Buena’s exhibition archive
  36. "Pleasure and Pain all Rolled into One," BIDA 2003 - Exhibition catalogue from the exhibition at Centro de Arte de Salamanca, Spain, pp. 110–113
  37. Magdalena Lewoc, p. 5, City Matrix of Life, Exhibition catalogue - Metropolis, Contemporary Art Gallery, National Museum, Szczecin, Poland, 2005.
  38. Simona Nastac, "The Sublime overcoming of the UltimateFrontier of Art: Its Rediscovery" p. 111, Absent Without Leave (AWOL), Biennial of Young Artists, Bucharest 2006, Published by Meta and Goethe Institut Bukarest
  39. Realitäten, Fotogalerie Wien, Fotobuch nr. 35/2005 p. 34-35
  40. "Gongzhen - Sport in Art" pp. 88–91 Catalogue published by, Museum of Contemporary Art MoCA Shanghai . The exhibition travelled to Museum of Guangzhou Art Academy; RCM Gallery, Nanjing; Shenyang, Museum of Lu Xun Art Academy; Sichuan Fine Arts Museum, Chengdu and Today Art Museum, Beijing.
  41. Introduction to Hüttner's solo exhibition at Blå Porten at Liljevalchs Konsthall http://www.xposeptember.se/archive/2004/?pgId=2&gId=37
  42. Web site: Interview with Hüttner in Art Review . 2010-08-21 . 2012-03-08 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120308134034/http://www.artreview.com/profiles/blog/show?id=1474022:BlogPost:3003 . dead .
  43. "Per Hüttner", Francesca Pagliuca, Tema Celeste 117, p. 102, 2006, Milano, Italy
  44. Xiao yao you, Catalogue de 15e Biennale d'image, April 2008, Nancy, France - published by Gérard Louis
  45. Zhang Wei, Xiao Yao You, Xiao Yao You, p. 33, Guangdong Museum of Art, 2006.
  46. "Tundro, znaczy wolnosc" Marta Eloy Cichocka, Fotograficzny Biuletyn 09/2006 (58), p.48-50, Poland
  47. "Joggaren har tagit en vilopaus", Anna Brodow, Svenska Dagbladet, Kultur s.9, May 12, 2007, Sweden. Online link (in Swedish) here http://www.svd.se/kulturnoje/konst/joggaren-har-tagit-en-vilopaus_227043.svd
  48. Per HüttnerDemocracy and Desire, p. 52, Democracy and Desire, 2007, Published by Vacio 9 and The Romanian Cultural Institute.
  49. http://www.bookworks.org.uk/asp/detail.asp?uid=book_2857B08F-6565-44BB-9F12-A3F912BA0C99&sub=new Hüttner's contribution to "Has Man A Function in Universe?"
  50. [(In)visible Dialogues]
  51. http://www.kunstaspekte.de/index.php?tid=55572&action=termin Press release at Kunstaspekte
  52. http://www.artinasia.com/galleryDetail.php?view=7&catID=0&galleryID=551&eventID=4342 Press release at Art in Asia
  53. Nathan Delancey, Les Mutations Actives de Per Hüttner, pp. 40–41, Novo Numéro 7, 03 2010, ISSN 1969-9514. Online version (in french) here http://issuu.com/media.pop/docs/novo_n_7?mode=embed&layout=skin.issuu.com/v/light/layout.xml
  54. Exhibition organized in collaboration with Sweden's participation in the Shanghai World Expo 2010.http://www.swedenexpo.cn/en/events/details/event/142/
  55. Cecilia Canziani, The Imminent Interviews - Per Hüttner, Fei Contemporary Art Center, Shanghai and Vision Forum 2010,
  56. The Invisible Generation, ed. Gerrie van Noord, design Marie Proyard, Published by Vision Forum, Stockholm, Sweden.
  57. OuUnPo[RTO], edited by Claudia Squitieri and Samon Takahashi, texts by OuUnPo, designed by Åbäke published by Dent-de-Leone and Vision Forum, 2013.
  58. A Score for an Entire City, Don't Look Back, ed. U. Ferm and M. Ångerman, Platform, Vasa, Finland 2011,
  59. http://www.nowiswere.com/issues/issue-7/ Nowiswhere issue 7
  60. http://www.nowiswere.com/issues/issue8/ Nowiswhere issue 8
  61. http://www.nowiswere.com/issues/issue-9/ Nowiswhere issue 9
  62. Jean Matthee, pp. 47–48 Space Matters, leaflet published by Tate Modern and NTNU’s Faculty of Architecture and Fine Art, 2011
  63. http://www.visionforum.eu/transversal-madness/ The organisation Vision Forum's website about the performance, retrieved 25 March 2021
  64. http://www.pikene.no/wp-content/uploads/%C3%A5rsrapport-2018.pdf Documentation in Pikene på Broen's annual report 2018 p.44 (in Norwegian and English). The document contains information about the events in Norway and Russia only. Link to pdf version online, retrieved 25 March 2021
  65. https://www.eegsynth.org/?p=1512 Documentation on the technology developer's website, retrieved 25 March 2021
  66. The artist's official website retrieved 20 September 2018
  67. Art performance maneuvre coeffcientss de visibilité, Ed. Michel Collet and André Létourneau,(in French), les presses de réel, 2019. Documentation of the event on p.236, 237 and 239.
  68. Ö- A Möbius Trip, Ed. Isabel Löfgren and Per Hüttner, Vision Forum, Stockholm, 2015.
  69. http://konsten.net/per-huttner-pa-galleri-fagerstedt/ Review of exhibition on Konsten.net (Swedish only)
  70. http://www.xposeptember.se/archive/2004/?pgId=2&gId=37 Exhibition website
  71. "I Am A Curator" Paul O’Neill, Art Monthly 275, p.7-10, 2004, London UK.
  72. https://2084.catalysti.fi/documentation/ Documentation on the organisation's website, retrieved 25 March 2021
  73. https://www.dansehallerne.dk/en/performance/start-in-the-middle The organisation's website, retrieved 25 March 2021
  74. https://www.folkteatern.se/evenemang/113-performs-hemispheric The theatre's website (in Swedish) retrieved 25 March 2021
  75. Troubled Waters (2015) 10th Baltic Contemporary Art Biennial, Contemporary Art Gallery, National Museum, Szczecin, Poland,
  76. [Lisette Lagnado]
  77. http://visionforumouunpo.blogspot.com/
  78. http://www.cneai.com/news-11 Event info on museum's website
  79. Barnaby Drabble, Nothing to Declare, Verlag für Moderne Kunst Nürneberg,
  80. Absent Without Leave (AWOL), Biennial of Young Artists, Bucharest 2006, Published by Meta and Goethe Institut Bukarest
  81. 20 År, pp. 36–39 Maria Bonniers Stiftelse
  82. "Curatorial Mutiny @ Nylon," Lee Triming, Flash Art, p.79, May–June 2001

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