Exhibition
CONSTANCE TENVIK: SOFT ARMOUR

OPENING
Friday 8 December, 2017: 7pm at UKS, 8.30pm at Kunstnernes Hus
Performance + DJ | 10pm Jenny Hval – 11pm DJ Jan Mayen at Kunstnernes Hus

TALK
Sunday 28 January, 2018: 3pm at Kunstnernes Hus
Raimundas Malašauskas on Constance Tenvik’s Soft Armour

EXHIBITION
9 December 2017 – 28 January 2018

VENUES
UKS, St. Olavs gate 3, Oslo
Kunstnernes Hus, Wergelandsveien 17, Oslo

In autumn 2017, a series of UKS solo exhibitions employs both UKS’ grounds and a part of the neighboring venue, Kunstnernes Hus. Second in UKS’ series of double exposés is draughtsman, masquerader, and filmmaker Constance Tenvik (b.1990, NO, based in Berlin and Oslo). Tenvik’s abundant, new production Soft Armour focuses on a disastrous attempt to restage a medieval joust at a Scottish castle in Ayrshire in 1839. This gothic reenactment, entitled “The Eglinton Tournament” after its initiator the Earl of Eglinton, was flooded by both a torrential downpour—disabling most of the chivalric acts—and by the unexpected turnout of around 100,000 spectators; in hindsight making this a milestone of mischief in failing to making fantasy and reality meet.

Employing this hilarious image of romantic longing, of regress to another time while being caught in one’s own ‘tense’, Tenvik creates a timely pointer to a current conservative retrograde and the idle potential of nostalgic folklore. Unapologetically invading a male world of knights with her makeshift show(wo)manship, Tenvik explores Eglinton’s bloated performance—when everything goes wrong—through candy-colored assemblage sculptures, figurative drawings, and living images, creating a social carnival recalling Scandinavian 1960s and 1970s pop underground and feminism.

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TALK
RAIMUNDAS MALAŠAUSKAS ON CONSTANCE TENVIK’S SOFT ARMOUR

Sunday 28 January, 3pm
Venue: Kunstnernes Hus

UKS cordially invites you to a talk by writer and curator Raimundas Malašauskas on draughtsman, masquerader, and filmmaker Constance Tenvik (b.1990, NO) taking place at Kunstnernes Hus on the final day of Tenvik’s exhibition, Sunday 28 January, at 3pm (free admission).

At Kunstnernes Hus, Raimundas Malašauskas will masquerade as a conversation piece, orbiting Constance Tenvik’s universe. Malašauskas has co-written an opera libretto, co-produced a television show, served as an agent for dOCUMENTA (13), curated oO, the Lithuanian and Cyprus pavilions at the 55th Venice Biennale, and keeps occurring under hypnosis.

The event takes place at Kunstnernes Hus and is part of Artists’ Matter, a series of talks on UKS’ solo exhibitions, inviting international thinkers to ponder the practices in question and to further develop the public deliberation into an essay. This series is supported by Fritt Ord.