Art Hub Residency : Presentation & conversation : Nanna Starck

As part of her AHC Residency program, Nanna Starck presented her work a summer evening in June. Together with authors Ida Marie Hede and Kamilla Hega Holst, the dived into the grotesque, transgressive and the taboo as a method in the artistic narrative. The conversation wasmoderated by art critic and curator, Louise Steiwer.

Based on Nanna Starck’s artistic practice and fascination with the abject, the conversation revolved around the grotesque body and why the extreme is so fascinating. Starck’s practice is centered around sculpture and relief, focusing on the sculptural body as a political tool. She uses boundary-breaking scenarios to address topics such as alienation of the body in society, feminism and body positivity.

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NANNA STARCK
Nanna Starck’s sculptural artistic practice is centred around the relief with a focus on the grotesque body, the abject, gender and sexuality.

Starck’s work with the sculptural body as a political tool uses boundary-pushing scenarios to address topics like alienation of the body in society, feminism and body positivity. Her practice has roots in Viennese Actionism, with its border-crossing performances, and reliefs from Antiquity, with their significance as pictorial narratives offering a platform to process emotions. The merge between absurd bodily scenarios with everyday objects creates a tension in her works often evoking laughter and disgust, as she exposes the tabooed body and shows its bodily holes for everyone to see.

Nanna Starck has exhibited nationally and abroad, an her work is in the collection of SMK, the National Gallery of Denmark, and has been acquired by the New Carlsberg Foundation and the Danish Arts Foundation.

IDA MARIE HEDE
Ida Marie Hede is a Danish writer, playwright, critic and teacher. She has written eight books and numerous plays. Her practice involves many artistic collaborations and publications: for example, with Cisser Mæhl, Niels Erling, Ursula Nistrup, Marie Kølbæk Iversen, Amalie Smith, Recoil Performance Group and CORPUS dance ensemble. She has also worked as an art critic for the Danish newspaper Information and the magazine Frieze. Hede is a recipient of the Danish Arts Council’s three-year work grant. Her books have been translated into German, English and Swedish, and in 2021 her latest novel Suget eller Vasker du vores fuckfingre med dine tårer was nominated for the Montana Prize and the Politiken Literature Prize.

KAMILLA HEGA HOLST
Kamilla Hega Holst writes original and quirky novels about people who deviate from the norm and have a different desire. Most recently in the novel “386” (2023) about Mai, whose ADHD diagnosis gives her an inner, vibrating restlessness that strengthens her sense of self, but at the same time threatens to destroy the nice home she is fighting to build. Kamilla Hega Holst’s books challenge the reader’s notion of what is beautiful and normal by giving voice and body to the characters who deviate.

LOUISE STEIWER
Louise Steiwer is an art critic and writer for the magazine Kunstkritikk, freelance curator and a part of the self-organized exhibition space OK Corral.