Catalogue > Un extrait vidéo au hasard

Paul Hendrikse

The Tape-Recorded Surprise, Interview With I.J.

Vidéo | dv | couleur | 11:36 | Pays-Bas | 2009

The video-installation The tape recorded surprise; Interview with I.J. starts from the intriguing life of South African poet Ingrid Jonker (1933/1965). Jonker became politically engaged in the fifties when she vehemently opposed a law imposing censorship on publications and entertainment. Her work was published in Drum, a clandestine ‘black’ magazine and rewarded South Africa’s most prestigious literature prize, but she was forgotten after her suicide in 1965. After the fall of the Apartheid-regime in 1990 Jonker became a figure of mythical proportions. Since then, Jonker’s texts and mediated identities are assumed, transformed into symbols then imbued with various meanings by interested parties. Actresses, biographers, admirers and politicians piece together Jonker’s story, growing it into something ghost- like – unfixed yet omnipresent. In the videowork two actresses are presented to us. Nicola Hanekom, recently played Jonker in a theatre-play. Grethe Fox, an older actress, knew Jonker when she was a child, and always wanted to play her. Paul Hendrikse worked with them and carried out various interviews. Subsequently he swapped the positions. Both actresses had to work together and try to close their respective gaps on both sides, each coaching the other on how to depict her falsified relationship to the iconic poet.

Paul Hendrikse est un artiste plasticien qui vit et travaille à Anvers et Berlin. Dans son travail, il explore les intersections entre l`histoire et la fiction. En quête d`une appréhension alternative d`événements historiques, il laisse de côté la grande Histoire pour s`intéresser aux micro-histoires individuelles, niant ainsi la possibilité de présenter l`Histoire d`une manière unique et autoritaire. Ses projets - souvent des performances ou des œuvres à caractère de performance -sont surtout le résultat de longs et sérieux travaux de recherche. Ils prennent forme dans divers médias, comme les publications, installations, œuvres audiovisuelles, et performances. Ces dernières années, son travail a été présenté entre autres au S.M.A.K. et au Kunsthalle Basel, à Onomatopee et à la Biennale Contour 2013. En 2011, il a remporté le Prix Langui de la Jeune Peinture Belge. paulhendrikse.net.