A Kassen (DK)
Urban Space
A Kassen
Christian Bretton-Meyer, born 1976, Copenhagen, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
Morten Steen Hebsgaard, born 1977 in Farum, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
S�ren Petersen, born 1977 in N�stved, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
Tommy Petersen, born 1975 in Esbjerg, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
A Kassen: the name itself suggests a humorous, playful approach to art. An A-kasse, (a union-affiliated unemployment insurance scheme that pays out benefit to unemployed members) is hardly the first thing one would associate with rampant creativity. But in recent years, the four relatively young artists involved have seen it evolve into a collaborative playground for projects that seek, not least, to reconfigure the encounter between artwork and public.
But most of what they do, they do together. A Kassen brings wit and inventiveness to art making. These artists reconfigure everyday life and the exhibition scenario in wacky and imaginative ways, entertaining and challenging the public all at once. For instance, they installed a sauna at the heart of an exhibition, allowing visitors to observe the artists in there sweating it out. Seeping through to the floor below, the sweat was collected in a bucket. For their graduation exhibition in 2007, they constructed a gigantic but unobtrusive chocolate biscuit, which, rosette-like, was inset into the ceiling, blending discreetly with the building's rococo stucco. And available at the cost of DKK 50 is their very own catalogue (of ideas), designed as a colouring book for children.
A Kassen contributes to U-TURN with a work designed to scatter confetti out over
S�nder Boulevard. The work, dubbed Mail , consists of a shredder that connects up with a letter box in a flat in S�nder Boulevard. A high-suction vacuum cleaner then blows the shredded post from the hallway through a piping system and out through a window onto the street. The postman is the agent who daily activates the work by feeding the letterbox with paper that ultimately re-emerges as a swirling snow flurry of paper snips. Mail turns an act of destruction into an amusing event and a wry comment on modern life - and the personal, valuable, superfluous and unwished-for pieces of paper it showers us with.
-CSJ
Morten Steen Hebsgaard, born 1977 in Farum, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
S�ren Petersen, born 1977 in N�stved, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
Tommy Petersen, born 1975 in Esbjerg, Denmark. Lives in Copenhagen
A Kassen: the name itself suggests a humorous, playful approach to art. An A-kasse, (a union-affiliated unemployment insurance scheme that pays out benefit to unemployed members) is hardly the first thing one would associate with rampant creativity. But in recent years, the four relatively young artists involved have seen it evolve into a collaborative playground for projects that seek, not least, to reconfigure the encounter between artwork and public.
But most of what they do, they do together. A Kassen brings wit and inventiveness to art making. These artists reconfigure everyday life and the exhibition scenario in wacky and imaginative ways, entertaining and challenging the public all at once. For instance, they installed a sauna at the heart of an exhibition, allowing visitors to observe the artists in there sweating it out. Seeping through to the floor below, the sweat was collected in a bucket. For their graduation exhibition in 2007, they constructed a gigantic but unobtrusive chocolate biscuit, which, rosette-like, was inset into the ceiling, blending discreetly with the building's rococo stucco. And available at the cost of DKK 50 is their very own catalogue (of ideas), designed as a colouring book for children.
A Kassen contributes to U-TURN with a work designed to scatter confetti out over
S�nder Boulevard. The work, dubbed Mail , consists of a shredder that connects up with a letter box in a flat in S�nder Boulevard. A high-suction vacuum cleaner then blows the shredded post from the hallway through a piping system and out through a window onto the street. The postman is the agent who daily activates the work by feeding the letterbox with paper that ultimately re-emerges as a swirling snow flurry of paper snips. Mail turns an act of destruction into an amusing event and a wry comment on modern life - and the personal, valuable, superfluous and unwished-for pieces of paper it showers us with.
-CSJ