Katrin Niedermeier
Somehow Clothing, 07.12.2021
In her work, Katrin Niedermeier reflects on the oscillating connections between the virtual space and the real world, while investigating the influence that technologies and the digital economy have on the human condition. Her recent work Somehow Clothing intertwines the virtual world of avatars and the trade of digital artefacts with performances, videos and the creation of real clothing.
Niedermeier copied digital products for sale online, such as female avatars and their fictitious accessories and environments, as well as the promotional and advertising elements on the websites selling these products, such as slogans and license agreements. From these elements, the artist has produced a limited series of clothes, sweaters and scarves. These garments are thus a translation of digital information into knitted analogue material, each garment specifically representing idle poses on the avatar sales websites. This work refers mainly to stereotypes relating to the representation of women's bodies and their functions in virtual universes. At a later stage, these sweaters are interpreted by professional dancer Zina Vaessen, who then interprets the poses of the virtual avatars, transposed into the garments, in a contemporary dance. The videos of the dances are published on HEK's social networks, somehow closing - or rather multiplying - the loop connecting the virtual and the real. Through these multi-layered actions of translation, feedback and reintroduction into new media, these avatars can be reactivated by the public who can buy the clothes and wear them in turn. The garments are on sale on the artist's website:
https://katrinniedermeier.com/...
HEK Net Works presented Katrin Niedermeier's work Somehow Clothing from 07.12.2021 to 10.01.2022.
Katrin Niedermeier (b. 1978 in Munich, DE) accomplished her master’s degree in 2019 at the Institut Kunst HGK, FHNW in Basel. She previously studied fashion design in Munich and Oslo and worked as a designer for Christian Dior and Jeanne Lanvin in Paris, and Nicky Hilton in Los Angeles. Recent exhibitions and video screenings include: To Be Human at Zona Mista, London (2021), Phenomenal Ocean at Ocean Space, Venice (2019), ihood at Kunsthaus Baselland, Muttenz (2019), color your color at EMAP Ewha Media Art Presentation, Seoul (2019), Hidden Bar, Art Basel (2019) and the group exhibitions Digital Festival DA-Z, Zürich (2020), and Hyperconscience at Shadok, Strasbourg (2018).