Original Handbags, 2008
Original Handbags, 2008
Photos: Projektraum 4. Mannheim. 2008
Courtesy by the artist and Olschewski & Behm Frankfurt
Description:
For a long time, I had a fascination, almost a fetish, for women’s handbags. I found them mysterious and seductive, and was intrigued by their extraordinary variety of shapes, colours, and sizes. What they contained remained, for me, a veiled mystery.
Around the time I created this piece, I bought a collection of second-hand handbags at the Humana store on Alexanderplatz in Berlin for very little money. I decided to turn them into performers.
I invited my partner at the time, Marcia Moraes, a dancer and choreographer, to help develop the choreography for the bags, which would be brought to life through computer animation. I composed a simple soundtrack and introduced a small yellow character who occasionally pokes his head out of one of the bags.
Together with Marcia, I worked on developing a dramaturgy for the piece, introducing a second act in which flying balls enter the scene and begin performing their own choreography.
Artwork Information:
Title: Original Handbags
Year: 2008
Materials: Second hand women’s bags, computer animation, sound, paint, video projector and speakers.
Dimensions: ca 300 × 400 × 20 cm
Duration: 6 min and 32 sec
Exhibition history:
Egill Sæbjörnsson, solo exhibition. Projektraum 4. Mannheim. 2008
Miami Basel Art Faire, i8 gallery. Miami. 2010
Categories:
Video Installation
Animation
Music & Sound