Jannicke Låker, 1997.
In connection to Oddvar I.N. Daren’s solo exhibition Local Land, Kunsthall Trondheim welcomes you to the screening Video art from KiT / Intermedia 1990 – 2000, with introduction by Jeremy Welsh.
The Intermedia department at KiT was established in 1990, after an initiative by artists Oddvar I.N. Daren, Terje Munthe and Merete Morgenstierne, and became the first specialised education programme in Scandinavia for video and digital art.
In this screening programme we will present a selection of short video works by students who were educated at KiT during the nineties, and some video works produced earlier will also be screened.
Many from that generation established themselves and became recognised names in the Norwegian art world. Here we can mention names such as Jannicke Låker (see image) Per Teljer, Kim Hiorthøy, Vegar Moen, Helge Sten, Anne Helen Robberstad, Geir Tore Holm, Søssa Jørgensen and HC Gilje.
Typical for the video works made during this period was that they tended to be short and very often borrowed references from cinema and popular culture. It was often the case that the artist was present in the work as performer or actor. Many of these young artists quickly established contacts with artist-run spaces in Scandinavia, so that their work quite quickly became known in the world outside the academy. Others established collaborations with other artists or musicians to reach out to a broader public. Kim Hiorthøy, Helge Sten and Vegar Moen all worked for an extended period with Motorpsycho, while HC Gilje collaborated, both while a student and afterwards, with the dance group Kreutzerkompaniet, one of the first in Norway to integrate video and digital images as scenography.
As well as video, a lot of digital art was produced at the Intermedia workshops, in the form of CD-ROMs, websites and interactive artworks based on computer game technology. While the video materials survive, and can be transferred to newer formats, much of the “pure” digital work has been lost. A CD-ROM, published as part of the catalogue to Screens, a major exhibition of video and digital art in 1997 (Trondheim Kunstmuseum and more) can no longer be viewed unless one has a computer running a 20 year old version of Mac OS.
As part of this year’s Meta Morf biennale there will be a project entitled “A Temporary Library of Norwegian Media Art”. This screening can also be seen in context, a little glimpse of Norwegian video art history.
Jeremy Welsh is currently professor of Fine Art, KiT, NTNU. Former professor, MA course leader and Dean of Fine Art at Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design in Bergen (UiB), Professor of Intermedia, KiT from 1990 – 2001. Previously co-director of Film & Video Umbrella, London, curatorial and production centre for artists film and video. Exhibitions co-ordinator at London Video Arts. Exhibiting as an artist internationally since the early eighties. Represented in public collections including The National Museum, Oslo, and has realised several large-scale public commissions.