'Puppets from The Parade of Rituals and Stereotypes 3'
From the video work 'The Parade of Rituals and Stereotypes'. A signed certificate accompanies the lot. Executed in 2012. Mixed media 155 x 45 x 205 cm.
Zach Feuer, New York.
Private Collection, Sweden.
Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg are among Europe's foremost and most idiosyncratic artists. Djurberg creates stop motion animations and Hans Berg, a musician and composer, sets them to music in close collaboration. Videos, spatial installations and sculptures form the basis of his work. Relationships between humans, animals and natural forces are the constantly pulsating theme in their world. The unifying force is desire. The desire to unite, destroy, dominate or escape.
The duo's work contains a lot of black humor and references to popular culture and art history. Hans Berg's hypnotic music suggestively amplifies emotional states and drives the story forward. The characters' alienation is palpable - they often radiate loneliness, low self-confidence or a distorted self-image, with appearances or behaviors that are not usually socially accepted.
The work 'Puppets from the Parade of Rituals and Stereotypes 3' is made up of handmade puppets that have all appeared in the 2012 video work 'Parade of Rituals and Stereotypes'.
Lena Essling writes in connection with Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg's exhibition at Moderna Museet in 2018. '... the figures in 'The Parade of Rituals and Stereotypes' (2012) are played off against each other, sometimes violently: Lucia parade, judges, fashion victims, upper class and exploited poor people. Heartlessly and hilariously, both characters and director eventually emerge as victims of their own vain fickleness. A capricious force controls a group of lost souls in works that breathe social satire - or perhaps a critique of God.'
The artist couple is represented at Moderna Museet in Stockholm, the Prada Foundation in Milan and the Museum of Modern Art in New York, as well as in many important international private collections.