For a Length of Time

source: snlno

Ane Mette Hol, norsk billed- og videokunstner. Ane Mette Hols tegninger, skulpturer, animasjonsfilmer og lydinstallasjonerer er resultater av møysommelige og tidkrevende prosesser hvor hun mekanisk, men presist kopierer tilsynelatende trivielle objekter og fenomen. Med utgangspunkt i funnet materiale utforsker Hol kunstfaglige problemstillinger rundt tegning, og kunst som kommersiell vare.

Hol er utdannet ved Kunsthøyskolen i Oslo og Konstfack i Stockholm i årene mellom 2001 og 2006, og har stilt ut bredt i Norge og internasjonalt. I 2011 mottok hun Statoils kunststipend som årlig deles ut til unge kunstnere i Norge.
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source: statoil

Strictly speaking, drawing is a result of lines on a surface, actual signs of a drawing tool. A conceptual expansion of the drawing’s scope of action, most recently also through light and sound, combined with a very precise mental approach and performance, are the characteristics of Ane Mette Hol’s work. She concentrates on the materiality of the drawing tools and the visual and ontological ambivalence of reality. What exactly are we looking at?

Using pencils and pens, Ane Mette Hol recreates paper-based and printed material down to the tiniest, minute detail; notebooks, rolls of paper, sheet music or photocopies. Hol recreates exact copies of various riffraff, such as used masking tape, sandpaper worn thin or a paint-stained sheet of wrapping paper – insignificant residue from artistic production and assembly. The complete craftsmanship and control over the elements used speak of the relationship between unique works and mechanical reproductions, content and void, optical conventions and illusion. The copy is remade into an exclusive original through Hol’s invested time and meticulous work. There is also a special visual sensibility and perception ability in this method. The amount of work alone elegantly reverses the mass of trivial products. Exhibited in a gallery, these illusory works occupy an unclear position between pre-studies, production and result. Nothing here is superfluous to the eye, but Hol’s works remain productively open to possible interpretations – of our experienced reality and everything art history is constructed of.
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source: trondheimkunstmuseum

Ane Mette Hol uses drawing as a method for investigating the relationship between originals and reproductions. Her painstaking work often results in accurately copied objects and phenomena, which may often seem mundane and trivial. Her works often infiltrate the context of the exhibition, or question the very medium of drawing. Hol’s working methods are signified by precision and patience; using paper and drawing tools, she copies things down to the smallest detail. Her technical skills are by no means overshadowed by the concept. Hol has made copies of brown paper, rolls of drawing paper, music sheets, drawing pads, floor paper, and book covers. She has reproduced print-outs from the internet, botched photo copies, and entire book jackets. The completed works could often be mistaken for the originals.

The term “Appropriation Art” was coined in the 1980s, and applies to works of art in which pre-existing artworks, photographs, brand logos, graphic design, objects, and other references to contemporary culture, have been used to create a new work of art. Appropriation art puts the relationship between copy and original up for debate; not unlike Dadaism, which saw random objects, objets trouvées, and ready-mades taken out of their functional context. In more recent times, pop artists such as Erró, Robert Fishborne, and Andy Warhol have re-appropriated Munch’s Scream. Similarly, Kjartan Slettemark’s Nixon Visions consists of a series of collages in which a well-known propaganda portrait of Richard Nixon has been manipulated with scissors and glue, and put into different montages with a cup from a Swedish coffee advert.

Sherrie Levine is usually labelled as an appropriation artist. She often photographs existing art, and is especially known for her works that are nothing more than photographs of Walker Evans’ photographs. Levine photographed reproductions of Evans’ images in an exhibition catalogue, and presented them, without any manipulation, as her own work, entitled After Walker Evans.

The relation between copy and original is as jarring in Ane Mette Hol’s works as it is in appropriation art. Hol’s art is also a commentary on our continuous recycling of what already exists, and on our common knowledge about art history and theory. She questions the nature of art; its premises in terms of content, politics, and institution. Starting out with found materials, Hol explores art theoretical questions surrounding drawing and art. She demonstrates remarkable technical skill, as well as innovative frames of reference and conceptual discourse.

In the exhibition at Trondheim kunstmuseum, Hol has based her work around a drawing of a photo copy from Charles Wood’s book How to Draw Portraits (1943). The drawing shows the book’s list of contents, and the exhibition is based on the different sections of the book. Works from the museum’s collections as well as Hol’s own works, new and old; drawings, animations, and sound installations, feature in the show. This includes her accurate drawing of a measuring tape, Untitled (Measurement Drawing) (2013), and the sound installation The Concept of Clouds (That Will Never Exist) (2011). The latter is described by Hol as a “digital drawing of rain”, in which the sound of one single drop of rain has been copied and layered, to give the impression of a rain shower.

Ane Mette Hol was born in Bodø in 1979, and grew up in Trondheim. She studied at Oslo National Academy of the Arts, and Stockholm University College of Arts, Crafts and Design 2001-2006, and has exhibited widely in Norway and internationally. In 2011 she was awarded the Statoil Art Award, and head of the jury, Olav Christopher Jenssen, stated: “The artworks by the winner of the 2011 award distinguish themselves formally, technically, and conceptually. They are quiet in terms of expression, and highly consistent in their exploration.” Hol’s work is represented at the National Museum for Art, Architecture and Design, and in Sørlandets