STAGING INDEPENDENCE
2007

Exhibited works —
HUMAN PYRAMID, 2007 | Metal sculpture
DEMOCRACY, 2007 | Colour photographs
LOUDSPEAKER, 2007 | Object
CROWD CONTROL, 2007-2008 | Borrowed metal object
FIRE, 2007 | Video loop

In Staging independence Anna Ådahl displays the props and the scenography with which the people and the mass are staged and stage themselves. The installation consists of a number of works in different media which refer to techniques for organization and control of masses, and for representation of the people as a stage act. A central work is Human Pyramid, a 1:1 reconstruction of a structure made to carry a mass of people, inspired by a photography by Rodchenko, Female Pyramid from 1936. In Staging independence one can also see Democracy, a series of photographs of peoples’ parks documenting their architecture and scenography, Crowd Control and Loudspeaker, two objects normally used to direct and control a crowd’s movements and the video Fire, which implicitly refers to Elias Canetti’s analysis of the fire as the symbol for the crowds inner desire and logic. 

“Fire is multiple. Not only does one know that there must be fires in many, indeed in innumerable places, but the individual fire itself is multiple: we speak of flames and of tongues of flame. In the Vedas fire is called ’The one Agni, manifoldly ablaze’.” Crowds and Power, Elias Canetti.

The fire featured in the video is the fire of Valborg (Walpurgis), which is celebrated by lighting huge bonfires and singing. These bonfires gather large crowds throughout Sweden. 

Exhibited at —
Staging Independence, Tell a friend, 2008, Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm.
Staging Independence, Crowd 0-infinity, 2008, curator Guillaume Désanges (Work Method), Art Center for Contemporary Arts, La Tolerie, Clermont-Ferrand, France.
Staging Independence, 2007, Ak 28, Stockholm, Sweden