Marianne Heske
Marianne Heske (born 1946 in Ålesund) is a Norwegian visual artist working across printmaking, photography, video and installation. She trained at Bergen's School of Arts and Crafts and continued her studies in Paris, London and Maastricht. Relationships between ideas, materials and the context in which a work is shown are central.
Doll heads, roles and moving images
Heske found doll heads in Paris in 1971. The mass-produced face became a means of exploring the individual, belonging and social roles. In her conversation with Videokunstarkivet, she describes how meaning changes with context. The doll head is thus more than a recurring decorative motif.
Nature Morté (Stilleben) appeared at the Autumn Exhibition in 1978 and again in 2009. Kunstnernes Hus describes an installation with a doll head, skull and video in which the doll head's image gradually merges into the skull. The physical arrangement and the time-based image work together.
Gjerdeløa as relocation and documentation
For Prosjekt Gjerdeløa in 1980, Heske moved a log-built hay barn from Tafjord to the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Documentation and visitors' encounters with the building formed part of the project. Two videos juxtaposed the barn's original landscape and its museum visitors. Relocation changed how the same building was read.
After its display at Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, the barn returned to Tafjord in 1981. Viti also records Prosjekt Gjerdeløa, 1980-1981/2010 as a portfolio of 30 prints, 40 × 60 cm. The portfolio and relocated building are different objects; the project years do not automatically date each print.
At Astrup Fearnley Museet in 2014, Heske developed the project further as tour Retour. The old barn was shown with a new cast in white, translucent synthetic resin and a painting by Adolph Tidemand. This juxtaposition reveals differences in material and the art-historical setting. The cast must be distinguished from the timber building.
Video painting and landscape
Heske has also used computers to transfer video recordings of western Norwegian landscapes to ink on canvas. SNL documents Landscape in Wind and Rain (1987), 175 × 220 cm, as a video painting. Here the term describes a physical picture derived from video, not necessarily a moving screen work.
Works, editions and ownership history
A documentary photograph, a print, a video painting and an installation must each be examined separately. A publication or poster sharing a motif is not automatically an artist's edition. Record the title, support, dimensions, technical information, any copy number, inscriptions and documented ownership history. Do not infer a general edition size from the number of prints in a portfolio.
For a time-based work, establish the file format, display equipment, sound, duration and any installation instructions. Owning a photograph does not itself mean owning the installation it depicts. Neither a signature nor biographical information alone establishes the authorship of a particular object.
For paper, fading, discolouration and mounting are relevant. For canvas and synthetic resin, describe the surface, distortion and any repairs from the object itself. The dimensions and materials of the documented examples above are not a standard for all Heske's works.
Read more about artist signatures, provenance and ownership history, Adolph Tidemand.
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