What is the ideal man? What is the ruling image? What do men think
themselves? Will the traditional relationships ever change? Are we going
to interact differently? Is there a new man coming?
What started three years ago as a personal search of Anja Sijben for
the ideal man, expanded in January 2011 in a collaboration between
international artists and scientists.
Three weeks of work, discussions and exchange in a laboratory situation
in ArToll, Bedburg Hau, Germany. All finalized with two days of exhibition,
lectures, workshops and activities.
Attending artist:
Naomi Akimoto (jp) Casper ter Heerdt (nl) Nicolaj Dudek (de) Elaine
Vis (nl) Michaela Kuhlendahl (de) Matthijs Muller (nl) Milan Gies (nl) Heather Allen (uk) Guda Koster (nl) Anja Sijben (nl)
In this blog you will first find two PR registrations, followed by impressions of the work of the attending artists.
Press, University of Nijmegen
Press Antenne Niederrhein
The sound work “I want more” is the internal monologue in one’s head. The inevitable urge of people to want better, bigger, more. It is a drive which makes us move forward and makes it possible to create. For which we need a concept of the ideal man for. To strive towards something ideal, which is not there in reality. And never will be, but the urge will stay alive.
Casper ter Heerdt
I started out by building a huge column like the ones our heroes used to stand on. My work applies solely to the human part of this ‘ideal’. Instead of looking for perfection I search for possibilities. I’m interested in the question ‘Who we are? instead of what we should be like. My column developed from a classical structure into a building for men to live in. I’ve played with images from cultural history and ordinary life. ‘David’ wears pink underpants and the ‘Thinker’ is on the toilet.
Nicolaj Dudek
My work is a way of drawing around the construction of an ideal man and cycling and surfing at the same time around the cliché of the Ideal Man in an ironically and humorous way. There are two approaches: one is ‘mechanical’-like drawings, that represent the construction of something and offer a way to explore the thoughts and feelings of the artist’s mind about the theme, and at the same time to relate to it. The other is ideas of certain aspects that I try to change and turn into another way of thinking e.g. the ‘muscle-drawings’, using the muscles as a symbol for male physical power and transferring them into other meanings by a desired grade of abstraction. As you can see, nothing is ideal, but for now...
Milan Gies
I think there is no such thing as the ‘ideal’ man, one needs ideals. But those ideals should always be reflected and placed in one’s own context. Otherwise we start creating super ideals, which make the world hard and unreal. There is perfection through the existence of imperfection.
The video “You have beautiful eyes” I made by using an existing exercise from a theatre school. Man struggles with being open and vulnerable. With striving and not being good enough.
Elaine Vis
Ideal men are powerful. Our world is made up winners. A man has to have a career to prove himself. Power was previously transferred by blood relationship, nowadays power has to be worked for. The base for the Ideal Man was the theme ‘man and power’. The classic men’s suits show male identity as a ruler. Each fabric represents a different individuality; the negotiator, the visionary, the networker; skills required for proper functioning are reflected in the fabric. Major decisions are always taken at the table. Under this table, the atmosphere changes, obscure things happen, there are unconscious processes that are not controllable. The beauty of power is undermined? Is our deepest fear that we are inadequate?
Heather Allen
As a child in the 50’s and 60’s I was brought up with the expectation that my ideal man (‘the right man for me’) would one day appear and sweep me off into a happy future. As he never arrived I can only assume that he got lost on the way...
Working on this project I’ve had to think about him again, and my thoughts go this way; I see the ideal man as a construct, the projected sum of society’s needs at any given time. BUT there are ideal moments for different reasons with different people (men and women). I like this idea much more; it opens things up. My work for this project is about ‘moments’ which could in a way be ideal. My self-portrait figures sometimes look inwards, deep in thought, sometimes they look outwards, playful, curious or anxious, sometimes they interact with each other - we all do that. Their actions are not ‘completed’, they are still open about what to do, which direction to take, and this could be exactly the right moment for the ideal decision...
Michaela Kuhlendahl
For the ‘ideal-man-project’ I have chosen to work with the hairy male body. Instinctively, hair does feel like a very personal bodily property and in its mythical meaning it is an expression of male and sexual power. So it has a certain charm that the men who donated their hair for my installations were conscious of the fact that I would use it as ‘material’ and that it would become alienated in the art work. The fact that several men refused to donate their hair makes the personal aspect even more obvious. Finally, I like the striking graphic quality of hair, so that in the end I didn´t work with ‘material’ but with lines and colors.
Naomi Akimoto
My work consists of two different approaches. One is the microscopic view, zooming in onto the mascular biological world on microscopic scale, resulting in drawings and an installation. Other work is based on Japanese literature (“Run, Melos” by Osamu Dazai. Published in 1940). The story is a reworking of Friedrich Schiller’s ballad “Die Bürgschaft”. The most prominent theme of “Run, Melos!” is unwavering friendship. Despite facing hardships, the protagonist Melos does his best to save his friend’s life, and in the end his efforts are rewarded. Also japanese educational stories form the base for my drawings (“Shigeki” and “Tamotsu and Shin” written by Rieko Matsuura, published in 1993, in which people have unusual body parts).
Guda Koster
During recent years woman has become highly emancipated. Man has adapted by developing his female side, but he has suppressed and forgotten his manly side. It is ‘not done’ to show your primal instincts as a man. The ideal man has to search for ’the wild man’ in himself. Lions, panthers, tigers in animal fabric silhouettes on the wall. This fabric has associations with challenge, danger and primal instincts. Men - show your strength, go hunting, measure up to other men and roar! Go back to nature and become the ideal man.
Matthijs Muller
For me the playing man is the ideal man. Playing is the source of all creativity. Whilst playing the man gets absorbed by his desires. My installations and objects, where the hand of Man is shown everywhere but the absence of the human is striking, are about the boundaries of control. With directly appealing, at first sight lightly and quickly recognizable work, I confront the viewer with unbridgeable contradictions. The use of material plays an important role, and a rearranging of materials, objects and context so that alienation and ambivalence arise.
