Installation

Karl & Carl – Still No Response From The Void

The artist duo Karl & Carl (Karl Hedin and Björn Carl Perborg) offers a generous mix of animation, sculpture, video and photography. Bizarre and uncanny situations occur as the searchlight is directed towards human beings and their relationship to the planet, the universe, life and death.

»Still No Response From The Void« (»Ännu inget svar från tystnaden«) is the title of Karl & Carl’s sincere and surprisingly accessible exhibition. On a jumpy road from science fiction to broken hearts, the artists navigate through the wetlands of poetry in a dialogue, where misunderstandings bring about unexpected meanings and where new connections constantly appear.

– It’s important to stay close to the limits of your understanding of the existence. That’s where we try to go in all our works, Karl & Carl explains. The exhibition is a tribute to the pointless, the ridiculous, the pathetic and the ungraspable. It also pays tribute to the cosmic distances. Between people. (Before this distance was measured to 1,5 metres).

A cabinet of grief with a coffin (or is it a spaceship?), images from crematoria and a video where people queue to throw themselves off a balcony, is combined with a pulpit, where a curator recites empty phrases collected from the curatorial statements of international biennials.

Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Pulpet with curator.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Beware Of The God, Doghouse.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Basketball lamp.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Voyager II, coffin and animation cabinets.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Props, bird mask.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Exhibition view from Galleri Box, Gothenburg, Sweden. Karl & Carl – Ännu inget svar från tystnaden 28/8–27/9, 2020. Handwritten note in display case.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler

Year: 2020
Dimensions: 50 m2

Review in Omkonst by Olle Niklasson (in Swedish)
Karl & Carl discuss the exhibition in Box Pod (Podcast in Swedish)

Karl & Carl – Terminus

The artist duo Karl & Carl (Karl Hedin and Björn Carl Perborg) offers a fascinating mix of animation, sculpture, video and photography. Bizarre and uncanny situations occur as the searchlight is directed towards human beings and their relationship to the planet, the universe, life and death.

»Terminus« (»Ändhållplats«) is the title of Karl & Carl’s thought provoking and surprisingly accessible exhibition. On a jumpy road from science fiction to broken hearts, the artists navigate through the wetlands of poetry in a dialogue, where misunderstandings bring about unexpected meanings and where new connections constantly appear.

Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden
Photo: Björn Perborg
Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden
Photo: Björn Perborg
Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden
Photo: Björn Perborg
Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden. Props, a bird mask, suspended on the wall.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden. Curator in pulpit. Video installation.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Installation view from the exhibition Karl & Carl ”Ändhållplats” at Galleri Gerlesborg, Sweden. Gravestone.
Photo: Björn Perborg

Terminus may refer to the last stop of a train line or bus route. Perhaps it is a crowded railway station where you can buy yourself a newspaper and change trains. Perhaps it is a desolate non-place on the outskirts of an industrial area, where the bus, after a five minute break, turns around to serve the same route once again.

Terminus may also be used in a figurative sense, indicating the final destination of a train of thought, an ideology, a political or artistic movement, a civilisation or the life of a human being. We may for example discuss the »terminus of nihilism« or, in an obituary, mention that someone, »after a period of illness, has reached the terminus of life«.

But the end can also be a beginning. Roger Penrose, recent Nobel Prize winner in Physics, suggests that our Big Bang is just one in a row of many. In the remote future, when the universe has expanded infinitely and time has ceased to exist, we will have massless Physics. A world, dominated by massless Physics doesn’t know if it is big och small. Thus, the remote future becomes the Big Bang of a subsequent eon.

Man, half ape, half cosmic intelligence, is approaching the terminus of his own self-understanding. The current geological age, the Anthropocene, is named after himself. Wherever human beings arrive, biodiversity declines. Most of the megafauna that once dwelt on Earth was wiped out by human beings already during the Stone Age. What do you do when you discover that you are a vermin yourself?

The exhibition »Terminus« directs the searchlight towards human beings (these walking digestive systems with exceptionally high thoughts of themselves) and their relationship to the planet, the universe, life and death.

Year: 2021
Dimensions: 45 m2

Stories From the Suitcase

An exhibition consisting of five oversized suitcases and a two channel video installation. In a personal way, all the works reflect upon places, travelling, origin and nostalgia. Every suitcase hosts a miniature art exhibition space inside. Suitcase 1 shows an installation with an animation, »The warmest winter in 250 years«.

Suitcase 2 shows another animation, »The tallest mountain in Europe«. Suitcase 3 shows another animation, »The city I live in«. Suitcase 4 shows yet another animation, »All the dead I’ve seen«. Suitcase 5 shows a photo exhibition entitled »Airport chapels«. It is a series of architecture documentation, documenting airport chapels – the prayer or meditation rooms that are to be found in most international airports. Also included is »The trip to America«, a slideshow with narration.

Finally, a two channel video installation is completing the show. It is »Immigrant Song«, in which, on one screen, Berlin-based drummer Hannes Lingens plays a variation of the drum groove from Led Zeppelin’s »Immigrant Song« using firework rockets as drumsticks. On the other screen fireworks on a night sky go off in synchronization with the drumbeats from the first screen.

Stories From The Suitcase, video installation with suitcases at Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin. Geschichten aus dem Koffer, videoinstallation med resväskor på Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin.
Photo: David Brandt
Stories From The Suitcase, video installation with suitcases at Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, interior from one of the suitcases, miniature exhibition. Geschichten aus dem Koffer, videoinstallation med resväskor på Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, interiör från en av väskorna, miniatyrutställning.
Photo: David Brandt
Stories From The Suitcase, video installation with suitcases at Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, suitcase on podium. Geschichten aus dem Koffer, videoinstallation med resväskor på Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, resväska på podium.
Photo: David Brandt

Year: 2009
Technique: Plywood, fittings, cloth, paint, LCD-screens, media players, photo, LED-light, video, animation
Dimensions: 150 m2 (179.4 yd2)

The Collectors

The Collectors retells a story about the Collyer brothers, who lived as recluses in New York City during the first half of the 20th century. Newspaper clippings, archive photographs, text and animated reconstructions are kept in filing cabinets. All together they speak about solitude, collecting mania and a stubborn fight for acceptance.

The Collyer brothers collected almost anything. When they died a hole had to be made in the roof to get in and clean the place out. Fifteen pianos, three tailor’s dummies, the chassis of a T-ford, a dinosaur egg, an early x-ray equipment, the jawbones of a horse, five violins, Christmas trees, two organs, fifteen thousand books about medicine, pinup pictures, baby carriages and more than six tons of newspapers were among the things removed from the house.

The Collectors, installation with filing cabinets at Galleri Box.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
The Collectors, installation with filing cabinets at Galleri Box.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
The Collectors, installation with filing cabinets at Galleri Box. Detail, archive photo and oranges.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
The Collectors, installation with filing cabinets at Galleri Box. Narrow piano sculpture.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler

Year: 2007
Technique: Plywood, plexiglass, pianos, oranges, mirror, light fittings, dvd
Dimensions: 40 m2 (47.82 yd2)

Flygfän [Flying Creatures]

Eight pictures in a room, like in a museum; most of them show angels with fire burns. Faint sound of choppers, barely audible. Night time tar was distributed on the floor to get the proper smell.

Flygfän, installation with paintings of wounded angels, in a room with red walls. Flygfän, installation med tavlor föreställande skadade änglar, i ett rum med röda väggar.
Photo: Lo Caidahl
Flygfän, installation with paintings of wounded angels, in a room with red walls. Flygfän, installation med tavlor föreställande skadade änglar, i ett rum med röda väggar.
Photo: Lo Caidahl
Flygfän, painting of wounded angels, queueing for treatment. Flygfän, tavla med skadade änglar som köar för vård.
Photo: Lo Caidahl
Flygfän, installation with paintings of wounded angels, in a room with red walls. Flygfän, installation med tavlor föreställande skadade änglar, i ett rum med röda väggar.
Photo: Lo Caidahl

Year: 2003
Technique: Photo collage on prepared canvases, wood, paint and sound
Dimensions: 160 m2 (191.36 yd2)

Making the Immortal

Making the Immortal is a poetical/political non-fiction film and installation by Anna Viola Hallberg and Björn Perborg exploring man’s quest to be remembered. This is made via the life and work of a portrait painter who passed away half a decade ago, Bror Kronstrand. Once an acclaimed artist who travelled the world extensively, today he is almost completely forgotten.
 
Making the Immortal is a subjective work where two artists reflect upon the traces of a third. The project is predominantly built upon archive material that has been reformatted to the selected narrative(s). Private photographs, newspaper clippings, objects, 16 and 35 mm film are taken further through video, photography, slideshows, facsimiles and enlarged segments of letters.

Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Projection on a book.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Double-sided swinging photo frame.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Quote from a letter.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Film projection.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Kronstrand’s self-portraits.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Slide projection room.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler
Making The Immortal, installation by Björn Perborg and Anna Viola Hallberg with Bror Kronstrand. Slide projections.
Photo: Hendrik Zeitler

Year: 2013
Technique: Archive photographs, swivel frames, book, trunk, videos, wallpaper, slide projections
Dimensions: 150 m2 (179.4 yd2)

Cuisine Bizarre – The Kitchen

Interactive video installation in the shape of an ordinary kitchen. As doors and drawers are being opened it is not cutlery, cups or gravy boats that are exposed but a selection from Cuisine Bizarre’s extensive production of cooking shows.

Collaboration with Frans Einarsson. Realised with the support of Konstnärsnämnden, the Swedish Arts Grants Committee.

Cuisine Bizarre – The Kitchen, installation at Konstnärshuset, kitchen with hidden video monitors.
Photo: Lo Birgersson
Cuisine Bizarre – The Kitchen, installation at Konstnärshuset, detail of drawers with video monitors.
Photo: Lo Birgersson

Year: 2014
Technique: Kitchen, monitors, magnet switches etc.
Dimensions: 160 x 60 x 210 cm (63 in x 23.6 in x 82.7 in)

Hamnmagasinet 2019

Exhibition in an old harbour storehouse at Slussen, Orust, Sweden, addressing the anatomy of a broken heart as well as the artist’s working conditions. Among the exhibited works are the animated film Money And The Video Artist, Procrastination, the video sculpture Nesting Box, Entertainment, the crucifix and a recorded lecture about the public commission Bass Drum Pedal.

Harbour Store House, Slussen, Orust, Sweden.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Art exhibion by Björn Perborg inside the harbour store house at Slussen, Orust.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Art exhibion by Björn Perborg inside the harbour store house at Slussen, Orust.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Art exhibion by Björn Perborg inside the harbour store house at Slussen, Orust.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Art exhibion by Björn Perborg inside the harbour store house at Slussen, Orust, Nesting Box, video sculpture.
Photo: Björn Perborg

Year: 2019
Dimensions: 80 m2

Being Björn Perborg

Retrospective installation at Konstnärshuset in Stockholm, including early performance based monitor works like Entertainment and the Tumble dryer, playful religious symbology in Flygfän, Crucifix and Aiport Chapels as well as the more recently animated observation reports.

In Stories From the Suitcase a David Attenborough-like voice-over guides us through five such stories presented inside a blown-up sculptural scenography. The interest for meta-art and artists’ economic conditions is represented in Money And the Video Artist.

Finally, a couple of brand new works are also shown. The Cuisine Bizarre Kitchen is an interactive video installation made in collaboration with Frans Einarsson and with the support of Konstnärsnämnden, the Swedish Arts Grants Committee. Most of the works had never been shown in Sweden before.

Being Björn Perborg, exhibition at Konstnärshuset.
Photo: Lo Birgersson
Being Björn Perborg, exhibition at Konstnärshuset.
Photo: Lo Birgersson
Being Björn Perborg, exhibition at Konstnärshuset. Money And The Video Artist, animation on display.
Photo: Lo Birgersson
Being Björn Perborg, exhibition at Konstnärshuset. Flygfän, paintings of wounded angels.
Photo: Lo Birgersson

Year: 2014
Dimensions: 126 m2 (151 yd2)

Alma Löv 2017

Exhibition in the Icelandic pavilion at the rural Alma Löv Museum of unexp. art. Some of the works shown are the animation All The Dead I Have Seen, the video sculpture Nesting Box, the sound piece Meditation Tape, the crucifix and the outdoor sound sculpture Balancing The Books.

Alma Löv Museum 2017, inside the Icelandic pavillion, nesting box and suitcase.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Alma Löv Museum 2017, inside the Icelandic pavillion, crucifix, nesting box and suitcase.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Alma Löv Museum 2017, inside the Icelandic pavillion, meditation stool and speaker.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Alma Löv Museum 2017, Balancing The Books, a sound sculpture in the shape of a Marshall stack and a grave stone, out in the field.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Alma Löv Museum 2017, Balancing The Books, a sound sculpture in the shape of a Marshall stack and a grave stone, out in the field.
Photo: Björn Perborg
Alma Löv Museum 2017, Balancing The Books, a sound sculpture in the shape of a Marshall stack, seen from the back in the field.
Photo: Björn Perborg

Year: 2017
Dimensions: Dimensions variable