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Old Habits Die Hard at ~Norwich Gallery’s Latest Exhibition

The exhibition Old Habits Die Hard is on show at Norwich Gallery until February 14.

It is the creation of Heman Chong and Lise Nellmann of Sparwasser HQ, a non-commercial artist-run space in Berlin where theorists and artists come together to discuss art.

Sparwasser invited 50 artist-run organisations to send in their favourite short art video along with the reason for their choice. Their only specification was that the films had to be made by someone outside of their organization.

The contributions come from the international art world and include The Deste Foundation (Athens), Rain (Los Angeles), PAS (Prague), >Projectgruppe< (Hamburg, Switchspace (Glasgow and rum46 (Aarhus).

Each day the exhibition presents a different selection of films and visitors are invited to watch them either on the gallery wall via a projector or individually on monitors.

The videos stand alone and do not need to be understood in relation to one another.

Foxie cutting Birthday Cake (2003) by Morten Larsen was chosen by rum46, a contemporary art gallery from Denmark. It is an amalgamation of short clips using animation, web-images, photographs and amiga-software.

Larsen explains it as ‘five scenes telling five different stories that somehow relate and complement each other.

The first story features two characters, a caricature of a man and the grim-reaper. These two fight in a bright technicolour world, whilst the grim-reaper keeps asking the question, ‘why is n0-one afraid of death anymore?’

After Death has been imprisoned in a vibrant rainbow the screen merges and we are able to see fragments of photographs in the background – scenes of soldiers, President Bush and maps of Baghdad.

The reason for uniting these images becomes clear; the film maker wants us to contemplate these recent events. The following short stories include talking goats visiting New York and a mini re-enactment of Noah’s Ark.

This piece asks some ‘big’ questions about the world we live in and is interesting, if slightly bizarre, but deserves a look. It reflects rum46’s interest in conceptual works of art and their attraction to the mediums of video and film.

Smile in the Crowd is the choice of Switchspace from Glasgow. A piece by Craig Mulholland (2003), it concentrates on the modern, urban world – the fast pace of life and the chance encounters we might have.

It is a computer-generated piece with a running commentary of questions on the backing track. The piece is interesting and reflects that this exhibition has a great variety of films to suit everyone’s tastes.

The organisers intended that artists should collectively curate the exhibition themselves and together make the films form their own exhibition.

The totality of the films can be seen to comment on the world around us and the organisers want us to think about self-representation and self-organisation.

Norwich Gallery is in the hub of the city’s art world and part of Norwich School of Art and Design. Consisting of two open plan rooms with white walls and wooden floors, it is a nice space and this exhibition is generally suitable for all – although not all of the films are suitable for children.

Admission is free so repeat viewing can be had which is essential if you want to watch all 50 of the films!