Neither Here Nor There, - Brittan Rosendahl's Portfolio

If Your Video Image Is Neither Here Nor There,

A mixed media investigation by Brittan Rosendahl and Dylan Thaemert.

February, 2014.

Project Biography.

Brittan Rosendahl is a Nebraska native and graduate of the University of Nebraska in Lincoln now attending graduate school at Tulane University in New Orleans, LA. Through his work, he hosts various discussions associated with found and appropriated imagery, as well as remix, and circulation. Dylan Thaemert, also a Nebraska native, is a graduate of Loyola University in Chicago, IL, and has a background in poetry. He curated the Petshop book exchange in an Omaha neighborhood called Benson in 2013.

In January and February of 2014 we met 3 nights a week in the studio at Petshop where we hand build 100 collages with the intent of producing a short video loop. We combined analogue methods of creation focusing on a digital means of final distribution. We wanted to investigate the spirit of collaboration by meeting ritualistically and generating a predetermined amount of content. We utilized a source material of expiring advertising and journalism that having exited the public consciousness is reactivated to generate alternative meaning. With the video in mind, we knew we needed to accumulate a lot of content. We hoped that in the process of creating 100 our own unique vocabulary would emerge.

Dylan continues to work in collage with a focus on the image as text. Brittan’s efforts at Tulane have been directed towards the production of a booklet, an edition of their strongest 30 works in collage. He’s also been producing large prints using this material as a base unit, sometimes exploring the works ability to resonate unassisted, often approaching context through mix and match pairings.

If Your Video Image Is Neither Here Nor There,

A project of Brittan Rosendahl and Dylan Thaemert at

Staple Goods in New Orleans, LA.

04-11 through 05-02 2015.

If Your Video Image Is Neither Here Nor There,

A project of Brittan Rosendahl and Dylan Thaemert at

Staple Goods in New Orleans, LA.

04-11 through 05-02 2015.

If Your Video Image Is Neither Here Nor There,

A project of Brittan Rosendahl and Dylan Thaemert at

Staple Goods in New Orleans, LA.

04-11 through 05-02 2015.

Gallery

Self-published book of photo collage and mixed messaging. 2015.

8.5" x 6.75", 32 p, $20.

Gallery

Self-published book of photo collage and mixed messaging. 2015.

8.5" x 6.75", 32 p, $20.

Sunday School #1 11-30-2014 London, UK Letter From New Orleans was a one day exhibition that took place on 30 November, looking at culture and contemporary art in New Orleans.

It featured works by New Orleans-based artists Bradford Willingham, Brittan Rosendahl & Dylan Thaemert, also Nina Schwanse, while Sophie T. Lvoff, an artist featured in the city’s 2014 Biennial Prospect.3 Notes For Now, travelled to London to be in conversation with DAM PROJECTS.

The exhibition also featured the premiere of DAM PROJECTS’ documentary film shot in New Orleans during the group’s two-week stay. The film features interviews with Prospect.3 Artistic Director Franklin Sirmans, Prospect.3 artist Douglas Bourgeois, Bounce MC Katey Red, artists, creatives and more.

DAM PROJECTS is a curatorial collective founded by Daniella Rose King, Amanprit Sandhu and Morgan Quaintance. Inclusive and anti-elitist, the collective use temporary exhibitions and events to support emerging, underexposed and unorthodox artists, art scenes, discourses and debates.

Sunday School #1 11-30-2014 London, UK Letter From New Orleans was a one day exhibition that took place on 30 November, looking at culture and contemporary art in New Orleans.

It featured works by New Orleans-based artists Bradford Willingham, Brittan Rosendahl & Dylan Thaemert, also Nina Schwanse, while Sophie T. Lvoff, an artist featured in the city’s 2014 Biennial Prospect.3 Notes For Now, travelled to London to be in conversation with DAM PROJECTS.

The exhibition also featured the premiere of DAM PROJECTS’ documentary film shot in New Orleans during the group’s two-week stay. The film features interviews with Prospect.3 Artistic Director Franklin Sirmans, Prospect.3 artist Douglas Bourgeois, Bounce MC Katey Red, artists, creatives and more.

DAM PROJECTS is a curatorial collective founded by Daniella Rose King, Amanprit Sandhu and Morgan Quaintance. Inclusive and anti-elitist, the collective use temporary exhibitions and events to support emerging, underexposed and unorthodox artists, art scenes, discourses and debates.

Sunday School #1 11-30-2014 London, UK Letter From New Orleans was a one day exhibition that took place on 30 November, looking at culture and contemporary art in New Orleans.

It featured works by New Orleans-based artists Bradford Willingham, Brittan Rosendahl & Dylan Thaemert, also Nina Schwanse, while Sophie T. Lvoff, an artist featured in the city’s 2014 Biennial Prospect.3 Notes For Now, travelled to London to be in conversation with DAM PROJECTS.

The exhibition also featured the premiere of DAM PROJECTS’ documentary film shot in New Orleans during the group’s two-week stay. The film features interviews with Prospect.3 Artistic Director Franklin Sirmans, Prospect.3 artist Douglas Bourgeois, Bounce MC Katey Red, artists, creatives and more.

DAM PROJECTS is a curatorial collective founded by Daniella Rose King, Amanprit Sandhu and Morgan Quaintance. Inclusive and anti-elitist, the collective use temporary exhibitions and events to support emerging, underexposed and unorthodox artists, art scenes, discourses and debates.

Sunday School #1 11-30-2014 London, UK Letter From New Orleans was a one day exhibition that took place on 30 November, looking at culture and contemporary art in New Orleans.

It featured works by New Orleans-based artists Bradford Willingham, Brittan Rosendahl & Dylan Thaemert, also Nina Schwanse, while Sophie T. Lvoff, an artist featured in the city’s 2014 Biennial Prospect.3 Notes For Now, travelled to London to be in conversation with DAM PROJECTS.

The exhibition also featured the premiere of DAM PROJECTS’ documentary film shot in New Orleans during the group’s two-week stay. The film features interviews with Prospect.3 Artistic Director Franklin Sirmans, Prospect.3 artist Douglas Bourgeois, Bounce MC Katey Red, artists, creatives and more.

DAM PROJECTS is a curatorial collective founded by Daniella Rose King, Amanprit Sandhu and Morgan Quaintance. Inclusive and anti-elitist, the collective use temporary exhibitions and events to support emerging, underexposed and unorthodox artists, art scenes, discourses and debates.

Bemis Benefit Art Auction. Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts. 11-21-15.

Tree Ring Cosmos.

Digital print from hand built collage.

54″x40″

Our estimate is that 90% of the source materials involved in this project were pulled from Joe’s Collectibles in Omaha, NE. One read of our creative effort is that this work is a site specific response that addresses environmental conditions existing at Joe's.

Joe's is a vast mix of secondhand items. What stood out specifically in this "catch all" environment were a couple of rooms of expiring paper media. It's a very democratic mix, printed medias commingle with little regard to the source objects status/purpose/heirarchy. Text books of erudition mix with print-based Americana. There are atlases and books on geography. Life, Time, and National Geographic, nestle amongst Playboy and Penthouse magazines. Books on high art, painting, and photography receive no differentiation than a common catalogue. Its a literal orgy of stale smelling print.

Joe’s is a great example of a condition known as "pool and flow". Media has literally trickled into the space at a greater rate than it has trickled out, thus we find a resource pool. In our view this flow from the firsthand market to the secondhand is a gesture of leveling. The source material utilized in our project is no longer simply content, it's general condition and it's sheer volume suggests a raw material-like physicality. All content, all objects were for this reason up for grabs. It all had become stagnant. Much of it wholly depleted.

The obvious theme to consider is that most of this content is dated to the point of replacement in a first hand market. The bulk of it dates within a window of 1950’s to early 1990’s. I’m not suggesting that the information contained in these texts is entirely useless, however I would argue that if one was researching, in most cases, it would be smart to look for newer versions to serve as ones reference.

Dylan and I set a goal of 100 strong collages, we worked for 2 months to achieve the goal and edited heavily. We physically manipulated the printed paper medium by hand, we cut, we ripped, we glued and taped. Dylan would start a piece, I’d finish. Our studio effort was very much a reciprocal workshop dynamic where we offered each other immediate feedback.

A few months later, I moved to New Orleans to attend Tulane. The project then developed remotely with a focus on post production and possible iterations of exposition.

These images speak to a language system freed of the specific ideologies they were born of. The prints foreground a unique set of concerns. In the gallery, a dislocated idea is communicating pictorially. It’s been opened to promote interpretation. As abstraction was our target, the reconfigurations encourage a reader to fill in the blanks. The viewer is urged to address the ambiguity. There is no correct reading, all readings are equally valued.

The video loop is fractured and fast. It sarcastically mimics the barrage of commercial messaging ubiquitous in our American landscape, but a hurried tempo condenses the communication available in an individual collage.

It is my opinion that appropriation art naturally wants to host a conversation of ethics. It should again be reiterated that our incorporation of print based objects speaks most directly to the availability of a post consumer good. Our interest was in the residual book/magazine object as a physical material waiting to be explored and of the situation of this space that held these items. Our reuse is less an attempt to force discussions of ethics. Instead, the investigation of the outdated print object enables a discussion on pictorial abstraction and mixed messaging which reveals itself after an initial gesture of dislocation.