ANNIKA LARSSON BY STUDIO BANANA TV

Studio Banana TV interviews videoartist Annika Larsson.

Annika Larsson is a Swedish contemporary artist, born in Stockholm in 1972 and currently living in Berlin. She received a Master of Fine Arts from the Royal University College of Fine Arts, Stockholm.

In this interview, on the occasion of her latest exhibition at La Fábrica gallery in Madrid, Larsson talks about her approach towards a post-produced composition of reality, about the psychological hidden dynamics hidden in the characters of her video pieces and about the evolution of her work, amongst other things.

Since the late 1990s, she has produced a body of work in video often consisting of men in highly-charged scenarios. Presented with a surface banality or with implied or explicit violence, and filmed in a sleek, polished style, without voiceover or dialogue, they are made up of slow gestures, dramatic camera angles and extreme close-ups. They create a subtle but palpable erotic tension.

In an interview with the Independent newspaper she said, “a cliché is something that we are supposed to see in a certain way. When you get close to it, it can have a new meaning – it is that twist I am interested in.” Critic Maura Reilly wrote in Art in America in 2004, “Larsson has consistently sought to expose masculinity as a performance, and to explore male power plays of domination and submission.”

She has exhibited at prestigious art venues including the Venice Biennale and Art Basel, as well as having solo exhibitions at the ICA in London, the S.M.A.K. in Ghent and the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid.

Interview by Studio Banana TV, translation by Noelia Correa.

Special thanks to Efraín Bernal and Álvaro Matías from La Fábrica.

All works courtesy of the artist and Andréhn-Schiptjenko Gallery.