Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
“当我到达动物园的地下层时，遇到的是空的笼子。由工业材料、饲料和再利用的商品组成的荒谬组合，与我在各个画廊看到的雕塑并无二致。”
Q: 你有喜欢的艺术家或作品吗?他们对你的创作有什么影响?
A: 我的作品之所以具有严格的主题性(或许我可以称之为分类学)，以及如何将这些作品序列化，形成自成一体的雕塑目录，这些都深受Andreas Slominski的“Trap”雕塑的影响。不仅在结构上，而且在方法上，因为我和他一样，在制作这个系列时使用了现成的工业或手工艺品。也许更重要的是，他和我的作品都在挪用与动物有关的功能性物品，都在探索功能的潜在性，他的作品是 "诱捕"，而我的作品是 "丰富"，我们都对这些物品被赋予和拥有的代理权以及挪用的功能是如何说明艺术体验或艺术品品质的引诱和主导方面感兴趣。
Q: Do you have any favorite artists or works? How have they influenced your creations?
A: The way my works are strictly thematic (perhaps I could go as far as to call it taxonomic) and how they are serialized into a catalog of self-contained sculptures is very much influenced by Andreas Slominski’s ‘Trap’ sculptures. Not only in structure but also methodology, as I, like him, utilize ready-made and industrial or artisanal crafts in the production of this series. And perhaps more importantly in the way his and my work are both appropriating functional items related to animals, how they explore a potentiality of function, in his case of entrapment and mine of enrichment, how we share an interest in the agency given to, and possessed by, these objects, and lastly how the appropriated functions illustrate luring and dominating aspects of an art experience or qualities of the art object.
Georg Nordmark, Anti Squirrel Bird Feeder Gazebo, 95 × 95 × 100 cm, Steel, polyester canvas, plexiglass, sunflower seeds 钢, 聚酯帆布, 有机玻璃, 葵花籽, 2024
Q: 你对未来的创作有什么具体计划或展望?有没有新的媒介、新的形式或特别想探讨的主题?
A: 我还没有实现一些已经构思的项目，多年来我一直觉得我的雕塑具有的动感特质需要与编舞家和舞蹈团合作进行探索，就像Mike Kelley的“Test Room”，其视频记录的舞蹈片段围绕着行为主义工具和运动装备的场景设计展开。
我也渴望通过我的水墨作品进一步向绘画领域发展，摆脱水墨的持久性，利用油画技巧来描绘不同材料的质感等，然而，我仍在尝试如何以一种有意义的方式将其引入并与我的整体实践相结合。
Q: What specific plans or prospects do you have for your future work? Is there a new medium, new form, or particular theme you would like to explore?
A: I have yet to realize several outlined projects, I have for many years felt that my sculpture's kinetic qualities need to be explored in a collaborative effort with a choreographer and dance troupe, much like Mike Kelley's ’Test Room’ where the video documented dance piece revolves around a scenography of behaviorist tools and athletic gear.
I would also have the urge to move further towards the painterly realm with my ink-washed works, untethered by the permanence of ink to utilize oil painting proficiency to portray varying material qualities, etc, however, I am still experimenting with how that can be introduced and integrated with my practice at large in a meaningful way.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
Q: 这次展览的作品包含了很多不同的材料。你在选择这些材料时有什么特别的考虑?
A: 我的工作方法在很大程度上依赖于为构成我的作品的主题、形式和材料建立标准，而这次展览的材料选择有几个标准。首先，我只选择我在研究动物 "丰富化 "过程中发现的材料，这些材料都具有一定的耐用性和/或可回收性；其次，我设想作品是成对创作的，在构思时会考虑到材料的对比性和共性，以及它们的形式，最终形成一个引人注目的整体。在这件作品中，我特别注意呈现的材料既要与画廊粗糙的混凝土墙壁和地板的斑驳灰色相协调，又要与之区分开来。同样重要的是新颖性，或者在原本简单的形式中加入意想不到的元素，避免陷入极简主义的套路，反而戏谑地否定其固有的稀疏性和非指涉性原则。
Q: The works in this exhibition incorporate many different materials. What special considerations did you have in the selection of these materials?
A: My method of working is very much reliant on establishing criteria for what subject matter, form and material constitute my work, and several criteria regulate the material choices of this show. First I limit myself to materials I’ve found in my research of animal ‘enrichment’, that have in common a level of durability and/or recycling, secondly, I conceive of the work in tandem, to create both contrasts and commonalities in the material chosen and the forms they can take to ultimately arrive at a compelling whole. In this case, especially I was careful to present materials that both harmonize with and distinguish themselves from the muted mottled grays of the gallery’s rough concrete walls and floor. Also important is the aspect of the novel or the unexpected additions to otherwise simple forms, to not succumb to Minimalist tropes but rather mockingly negate its inherent principles of sparsity and non-referentiality.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
Q: 你的作品包含了很多与动物有关的元素。你是如何获得这些元素的灵感的?
A: 这个想法是我在2016年参观柏林艺术周时产生的。当时我看了许多画廊展览，感到视觉疲劳和无聊，需要一些不同的东西来净化我的视觉感受。我带着笔记本和铅笔去了柏林动物园，打算画那里的动物。然而，当我到达动物园的地下层时，我就看到了空空如也的笼子，因为九月天气温暖，动物们都被关在地面上。然而，瓷砖笼子里的动物却更加有趣。这些由工业材料、饲料和再利用的商品组成而成的荒诞作品，与我在各个画廊看到的雕塑并无二致。我了解到，这些被称为“行为丰富化”: 为诱发野生动物的行为和动作而制作的专用玩具和饲料器具，作为补偿动物在隔离和贫困生活环境中的福祉措施。令我印象深刻的是，这些物品成功地表现了我一段时间以来一直试图想在艺术上表达的东西：一种运动感、能动性和动物性。而我之前的作品也涉及舞蹈、反传统和后人类主义。
Q: Your works contain many elements related to animals. How did you get the inspiration for these elements?
A: The idea came to me on a visit to Berlin Art Week in 2016. I had stared myself blind and bored at gallery shows and felt a need for something different, to cleanse my visual palate if you will. I went to Berlin Zoo with a pad and pencil to draw the animals there. Once at the Zoo in the subterranean level, I was met with empty cages as the animals were kept above ground due to the warm September weather. What remained, however, in the tile-clad cages, was all the more interesting. Presented not dissimilarity from the sculptures at the various galleries I’d been to were absurd assemblages of industrial materials, feed, and repurposed commodities. I learned that this was what is called ‘behavioral enrichment’: bespoke playthings and feeders made to evoke behaviors and movements observed in the wild, as a measure of well-being to compensate for what is otherwise a harmfully isolated and impoverished living environment.
I was struck by how these objects succeeded in representing what I had been trying to express artistically for some time: a sense of movement, agency, and animality, having previously made works relating to dance, iconoclasm, and post-humanism.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
Q: 你如何看待观众对你作品的不同解读?这些解读是否对你的创作提供了反馈或灵感?
A: 我尽量不干涉我的作品的寓意或批判性含义，因为我担心那样会抑制我的好奇心和过程的可塑性，同时也会损害观众的解释权。然而，我非常欣赏收到的反馈，并且这些反馈无疑促进了未来作品的形成。它们主要分为两类:一是引发的想法或解读，二是感知到的当代艺术参考或联系。
Q: How do you view different interpretations of your work by the audience? Do these interpretations provide any feedback or inspiration for your works?
A: I try not to meddle in the allegorical or critical implications of my works, as I fear that would inhibit the curiosity and plasticity of my process as well as impair the interpretative prerogative of my viewers. The feedback I’ve received however is much appreciated and undeniably formative for later work. They come in two main categories as they are either an evoked idea or interpretation or a perceived contemporary art reference or kinship.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
Q: 水袋和绳子的使用赋予这俩系列作品强烈的结构感。这种结构是你最初概念的一部分吗?
A: 绝对是的。这些作品有一种巨大化的感觉，我打算通过非常简单的手工艺(如编织和绳索作品)来探索这一点，但使用的组件要比平日练习中的大得多。猴拳结通常用细绳制成，作为止绳结或重线结，但用10厘米厚的系泊绳制成后，它就变成了完全不同的东西，达到大型哺乳动物或蜷缩的人的比例。拉伸框架上的斜纹编织消防软管既是雕塑性的姿态和形式:通过交织扁平的软管来创造体积和刚性，同时也具有绘画形式主义的能力，像是拉伸并大幅缩减的编织或原始的画布。最后，这些材料和结构吸引我的是它们几乎催眠般的特质，因为结绳诱使我们从视觉上解开它，而我们对编织的观察在整体和个别部分之间摇摆不定。这很可能是使绳结和蜿蜒曲折的线条成为突出的象形文字或认知隐喻的特质，同时也与艺术如何通过错综复杂的方式吸引观众进入沉思状态的方式极为相似。
Q: The use of hoses and ropes gives these two series of works a strong sense of structure. Was this structure a main part of your initial concept?
A: Absolutely. There is a sense of gigantism in these works that I intended to explore, which is achieved simply by utilizing very simple crafts like weaving and ropework but with components that are much larger compared to what is common practice. Monkey paw knots are commonly made with thin rope as a stopper knot or weighed heaving line but by making it from 10 cm thick mooring rope it becomes a different beast altogether, achieving the proportions of a large mammal or perhaps a huddled man.
The twill-woven firehose on a stretcher frame is a sculptural gesture and form: it creates volume and rigidity by interlocking flattened lengths of hose, but also achieves a painterly formalist capacity, as a stretched and severely diminished weave or primitive painters canvas.
Lastly: I’m drawn to these materials and structures for their almost hypnotic qualities as the knot beckons to be visually untangled, and our view of the weave oscillates between its whole and individual parts. This is most likely the quality that makes knots and meandering lines such prominent pictograms or metaphors for cognition but also shows great likeness to how art often mesmerizes its viewer to a state of contemplation through intricacies that demand our examination.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark4
Q: 你能谈谈你的作品如何聚焦于动物却保持视觉上的克制和冷静吗?
A: 这是有原因的。由于这一系列作品的构思方式(看到空的动物园笼子和这些物品的组合)，动物 的缺席似乎总是至关重要。部分原因是为了表达它们从我们当代城市生活中的消失:我们在开发 中将以前熟悉的家畜关系工业化，并使难以置信数量的野生动物走向完全或接近灭绝。它们的缺 席和作品克制的呈现为艺术观众提供了空间，观众在沉思中取代了动物的位置，试图通过艺术的 新奇事物来丰富他们的生活。
Q: Can you talk about how your work focuses on animals but remains visually restrained and calm?
A: There is a reason for this. With how the series was conceived of (seeing empty zoo cages with these assortments of items) the absence of the animals always seemed crucial. Partly to express the idea of their disappearance from our contemporary urban lives: how we in our exploits have industrialized the formerly familiar relationship to farm animals and brought an unfathomable amount of wild animals to complete or near extinction. Their absence and the work's restrained presentation make way for the art audience who, in contemplation, take the place of the animal, as they attempt to enrich their life with the novelties of art.
Installation View, Artworks ©Georg Nordmark
Installation View, CHART Art Fair with Carl Kostyál, Copenhagen, 2023
Photo credit ©Georg Nordmark
Installation View, Art Cologne – New Positions, Cologne, 2022
Photo credit ©Georg Nordmark
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