Nina Jan Beier & Marie Jan Lund

In their artistic partnership Nina Jan Beier and Marie Jan Lund examine the relations between human beings. The artists construct situations and games for groups of people following a certain set of rules and simultaneously document the consequences of these social experiments for the people involved. Their focus is directed towards the little details in the behaviour of different groups expressed as individual reactions, moods and tensions – as the participants try to follow different instructions like switching clothes in a circle, clapping in time or holding their breath as long as possible. In this connection the authority of the camera both reveals and provokes the staged group dynamic processes. The artists’ work shows a fascination with the most fundamental human behaviour, while at the same time it can also be seen as a partly absurd and very entertaining examination of the relationship between individuality and conformity along with a demonstration of compliance and people’s individual adaptation to group behaviour in social interactions.

The exhibition Dance Like I Do is based on a twin exhibition concept developed by Nina Jan Beier and Marie Jan Lund in collaboration with Overgaden in Copenhagen and The Aarhus Art Building. The title of the exhibition has its background in a video work in two parts where the two artists try to dance like one another while the onlooker is blocked from seeing them both at the same time. While Marie Jan Lund tries to dance in Copenhagen in the same way as Nina Jan Beier dances in Aarhus and the other way round the idea of the original dissolves, which engages the visitors in a shadow play consisting of only copies and reflections.

Thus the doppelganger parameter becomes the central aspect of the exhibition, which consists of photographs, videos, sound works, texts and interactive objects divided between the two exhibition places. The exhibition in The Aarhus Art Building consists of about 20 films from the body of works entitled “The Play Me Series” which after a strict choreography will be shown on four large projection screens.

Nina Jan Beier (b. 1975) and Marie Jan Lund (b. 1976) initiated their collaboration while studying at the Royal College of Art in London. In the beginning of 2004 they formed the artist collective Janfamily where all members took the middle name Jan. Nina Jan Beier and Marie Jan Lund, who live and work in Copenhagen, Berlin and London, have participated in a number of solo, duo and group exhibitions in Denmark as well as abroad.

Nina Beier & Marie Lund
Dance like I do