VIDEO 2008
Mediale Reflektionsräume: Positionen zeitgenössischer Videokunst
06 March - 22 March 2008

JEN DeNIKE shows
DUMB-BELLS and FLAG BOY

Feburary 14– MARCH 01, 2008

Jen DeNike presents in a series of works, simple contests amongst friends, in an exquisitely reduced manner: the role behaviour of two adolescents and their gestures of power and self-dramatization are tested in contests of catching, dunking and dumb-bells and by this are exaggerated to the maximum

In her work presented at duvekleemann, Jen DeNike reflects upon parts of her oeuvre that often deals with conditional behaviour and rituals of self-dramatization, as well as classic stereotypes of a young and everyday America.
In her video “dumb-bells”, one of two videos presented by duvekleemann berlin, she picks out specifically male role models as a central theme. DeNike often does not even practise those film sequences with her protagonists, whom she often casts straight away from the streets. She only gives her impersonators minimal stage directions and then observes with her camera, how the scene develops. In her video “dumb-bells” two friends have the mission to lift a dumbbell as often as they can.

The video is – and that’s also typical for her way of working – equipped with an unaltered sound and is not technically revised. The intensity that the film reaches by this method is remarkable. Because the film is not technically revised and the camera catches the scenario in a way incidentally, it reminds of everyday viewing habits and therefore the observer becomes part of the event. It nearly gives the impression that the observer is physically present at the event.
From the sober experimental set-up of lifting weights develops a multifaceted interaction between the two young men. It’s about who is the stronger one and who can go beyond his former limits. As one gives up, the other one pursues his goal with total determination. Supported by his friend, who in turn uses his re-positioning in the portrayal in the inducement of his friend, whom he provokes go beyond his former limits, in order to reach his goal. He wants to manage even more repetitions. He goes to the outer limits of the physically possible. Still, the picture always stays authentically. The pictures that DeNike captures with her camera range between competition, mutual incitation, triumph, awkwardness and eroticism.

Stereotypes indicated by means of a competition between two American adolescents, against the background of slightly aggressive, competitive conduct, mixed with friendship, couldn’t be more clearly communicated by the means of this simply produced videos.