NARVE HOVDENAKK Neoman, Sorry.remix
Opening reception
Friday 16 November from 6pm
By remixing myself into forms of pop syllogism a lot of my production is a series of loop based video samplings where my
aim is to destroy and reshape the narrative. Using myself as a character I am interested in the chaos that evolves in the search
of identity. The characters choose narcissist masculinity, and they try to annul castration. They are not fantasies, but transform concretely into political and social truths. The male character is forced to put himself and his body at stake to exist. (NH. 2007)
Narve Hovdenakk’s frontal videos subvert or rather invert the “male gaze” by reorganizing the subject-object structure while introducing a “third” party that is invisible. The spectator is confused in these compressed narratives of acted out abuse and vulnerability. Neoman addresses and plays with stereotypes of authority and harassment while leaving open the identity of the victim (male, female?). Sorry.remix investigates a certain scopophilia attached to cinematic strategies and questions the male character’s power. Though the editing and the camera angles owe a lot to the most interesting of commercial cinema, the works retain a theatrical quality, due in great part to the artist’s presence as an actor and his choice of exterior monologue.
The ambiguity of the work can be provocative but the fine balance between hard core sexual politics and taking the mickey out
of clichés rekindles the question of who is the active viewer of the text.
Narve Hovdenakk (*1971, Norway) studied at the Art Academy in Trondheim (NTNU), Norway and the Art Academy in Malmö (KHM), Sweden. His work has been recently exhibited in Gallery F15, Moss , The Young Artists Society, Oslo TAFKAG Gallery,
Oslo and the First Athens Biennial. He lives and works in Oslo.
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